


Wherever you go (I will follow)

by DoEScasTIElLove



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Animal Transformation, Dysfunctional Family, F/M, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Growing Up, Hogwarts, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Jealousy, M/M, Marauders Era (Harry Potter), Marauders Friendship (Harry Potter), Scars, Slow Burn, Transformation, Walburga and Bellatrix are not nice to Sirius, animagi, wolfstar
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-09
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-02-20 12:41:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 41,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22184041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoEScasTIElLove/pseuds/DoEScasTIElLove
Summary: There were four boys, four eleven years old boys, who had their lives ahead of them.Maybe it was fate, that brought them together, that first day of their joined Hogwarts career, maybe it was luck, but it should bring years of mischief and laughter and healing and pain. For none of the boys was ordinary or had an easy life ahead of him, and they would probably later look back at those years and cry and sigh and be happy they had had each other.So let's dive into those years, from the beginning to the end, from heartache over acceptance to trust and how the love of friends can make magic happen.
Relationships: James Potter/Lily Evans Potter, Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 15
Kudos: 35





	1. The first Year

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, hello!  
> This is my first Wolfstar work and for some reason I wanted to go all the way.  
> So buckle up, I hope you like it and don't forget: a comment or a like can mean the world to an artist (of whatever kind)^^

„Come on, Remus we have to hurry," Lyall Lupin shouted at the sandy-haired boy running beside them. Said boy had wide open, amber coloured eyes and a look of pure fear-induced excitement on his face.

He had never gone anywhere besides their backyard, he thought while hurrying along through a very crowded King‘s Cross station, although his parents had told him that they had once visited his aunt, who they never spoke of again when he had been just a baby. He knew the reasons, well, to be precise, the one reason and he really should be glad, that he was running right now across this strange train station, having said goodbye to his mother by the car, but deep inside he knew he was just so utterly terrified that everything would go wrong.

What if they can see, what if nobody likes me and what if, Merlin forbid, somebody gets hurt, were the thoughts that had constantly been swivelling around in his head like flies for the last half a year at least. Half a year ago, when-

"All right, Remus, you have to run through the barrier now, do you understand?" The boy addressed just nodded and dwelled on this feeling he got when his parents seemed to think he was not only a werewolf but also deaf or stupid. But he shouldn't think like that. They were doing their best, even if it meant checking his luggage three times and stuffing so much chocolate inside, it could last for his entire Hogwarts career.

What was at a second thought a bad choice of word, because as he feared, it wouldn't be a long stay at Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry for him.

The young boy thought all of this while running directly towards the wall between platform nine and ten and coming out at a steam-filled railway station, where a big red train seemed to absorb children as a sponge did with water.

‘You shouldn't daydream all the time if you want people to talk to you at school,' his mother Hope had told him the evening before while putting him to bed and combing through his hair with her fingers. I don't think that will be the biggest problem, he had wanted to say but just nodded. He couldn't burden her with his fears and problems, not since he was already all of hers.

Suddenly a hand pushed him slightly forward, and he came back to the here and now, realizing that it was his father, having entered the platform behind him and pushing his trolley to the train.

"Be a good boy at school, all right?" Lyall asked before helping his young son up the stairs. Again, he nodded, and his eyes followed his luggage that was taken care of by a man in train-assistant-uniform. "And write us if there is any problem, will you?" his father almost demanded, but the train had started to move, and there was no time for an answer since the doors had closed.

Standing a few moments dumbstruck in the entrance passage, Remus Lupin turned slowly around and made himself ready for a journey he had never thought he would attend.

-

_Half a year earlier_

"He is not safe there, what if something happens while we're not there?" a woman's voice all but shouted through almost all of the rather tiny house.

"Well look what happened with us protecting him," the voice of a man uttered rather quiet in comparison to the woman. The doorbell rang and the boy, who had been trying to ignore the usual fighting of his parents by reading one of the new books he got for Christmas, hopped from his bed and down the stairs.

Before any of the adults in the house could have reacted, he had looked through the peek hole in the door, had seen an elderly seemingly harmless old man with a quite long white beard and had opened the door. At least he had tried to since it was hexed and didn't open any wider than a few inches if not told the password.

For which, not wanting to be a further burden to his parents, the small boy had never asked.

"Hello Remus," the elderly man had voiced looking over a rather weird pair of glasses, shaped like half-moons. He looked exactly like-

But that couldn't be. It couldn't be… it couldn't be Professor Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts, standing in the Lupins very humble front yard.

I must be dreaming then, the young werewolf thought. He had read all about this weird colourful and also powerful wizard in Hogwarts, a history and some other magical books he couldn't recall, but that his parents had given him at his request. They never denied him anything, unless it was, in their judgement, dangerous and books were the one thing that he never grew bored of.

"Who are you?" young Remus asked but was then guided away from the door by the gentle hands of his mother. Never touch too firm, never speak too loud to him and never ask what he remembers of the full moon.

The door opened fully, and the man came in, following Lyall to the living room and talking to him, but not after having winked at Remus whose eyes widened at the mischief in the others.

"-we would have prepared something if we knew that you'd come, Professor Dumbledore," the young werewolf heard his father say as he followed his mother into the living room.

"Ah, well, it's fine, I just wanted to talk to young Remus personally." The addressed boy suddenly stood stock still, fighting against any emotion creeping into his face. "Since we talked for the last time, a few… arrangements have been made."

Remus ought to think that he wasn't a thick boy, of course, he couldn't know, since he didn't know any other children, but he couldn't, by the love of Merlin think of what the powerful wizard in his living room was getting at.

Because of that, the next sentence was a complete surprise for the boy and left him speechless.

Looking over his half-moon glasses, Albus Dumbledore said the following words.

"Would you like to go to Hogwarts, Remus?"

-

Of course, young Sirius Orion Black thought to himself as he watched his father shake hands with a rather arrogant looking tall wizard, of course, somebody had to recognize them. But he should have known; Orion and Walburga Black probably just left the house this morning to meet and impress some people.

There had been a time when Sirius would have thought this without a hint of grief and only pride regarding the prominence of his pure-blood family, but this time had started to come to an end with an incident about two years earlier. The young Black had played outside of the house with some muggles, which had resulted in an endless screaming from his mother about how no son of hers could be seen with such ‘dirty companions' and he was locked in his room for seven days.

Regardless of how much he had started to hate listening to his mother's never-ending remarks about the horrible things muggle blood would do to the wizarding society, he was still a Black, a pure-blood and wanted to make his parents proud so they would love him one day.

Turning around towards the steaming red train and thinking about the next half a year, he would spend away from his family, the young boy started to feel a little bit nervous. Would the sorting hat put him into Slytherin like all his family members before him and would he find friends there?

There had been a lot of people admiring him and his impressive family tree, but he never knew the feeling of being liked because it was him.

A firm hand on his shoulder stirred Sirius out of his thoughts, and he turned around, just to find his mothers face overshadowed with disgust, as if she was looking at an unpleasant insect rather than a child.

"You will behave, young man," she said without an inch of doubt in her voice. Sirius looked over at his father whose facial expression seemed to have been carved in stone.

"I expect for you to make this family proud," were the last words the young pure-blood heard before turning around without nodding and entering the train. His mother would have probably stopped him to force an answer out of him, but the doors were already closed.

-

The train ride had been loud and rather tiring for the young werewolf, seen as he was already ‘of bad health' as his mother used to tell his dad when they thought he wasn't listening and he spent the first few hours just watching people.

First, he had observed how everybody had taken a place, friends had found each other and first years like him had made nervous first connection. He walked past a lot of compounds, being too much on edge to sit down despite the fact that he hadn't slept properly in days. Finally, after hours of pacing, young Remus had settled down on a bench next to a small blond boy, whose face looked more miserable than he himself felt.

"Hi," the other boy had stuttered nervously, and Remus had smiled encouragingly. He felt as if nobody should feel out of place but him and maybe he could just make one life a little bit easier before going home.

"Hello, I'm Remus, what's your name?" he said in a slow, calming voice he had mastered over the years to disguise his real feelings.

"Er…" The other boy shook his hand with clammy fingers and replied: "Peter. Peter Pettigrew."

He had a smear of chocolate on the side of his mouth, smelled like an old wardrobe and Remus felt pity more than anything towards him, but it still felt like one of the biggest achievements in his whole life.

They had talked a bit more, about sweets and Hogwarts and the ride had been over before Remus could register it fully. The next steps, exiting the train, going to the boats with the groundkeeper, a very tall guy named Hagrid, floating across the lake and walking up all the stairs to the great hall seemed to have happened in a blur for the werewolf.

He would not be able to say afterwards who had been in his boat, even though there was a high probability that Peter had been there, and he also didn't register any of the other faces around him since his heart beat in his chest as if he was a mouse which had, as he recoiled, very high heart rates. While thinking of it like this though, a mouse was probably the farthest from his furry ‘friend' that he transformed to every month.

"Remus Lupin," the voice of a thin black-haired witch with a big green hat announced. She had a second hat in her hand, and it only took the werewolf an instant to register what she would want that for. Right, the sorting. The everybody-stares-at-you-and-sees-that-you-aren't-human thing.

He stumbled to the front, everything seeming to blur around the edges and Remus realized two things, the moment he turned around.

First: There were a hell of a lot of students in Hogwarts, more children than he had ever seen at once. And second: The room was swaying slightly since he apparently had forgotten to breathe for the last moments.

The werewolf drew a sharp breath and then his view already turned black, but not because he fainted as he realized, but because the hat, that had been put on him by the witch had slid over his eyes.

"Oi, what a nervous folk!" a voice exclaimed and Remus flinched, even though he knew that the hat would speak with the students from time to time.

"But you're not so nervous about the house you will be sorted in, are ya," the hat continued, and the young boy didn't dare to nod, regarding that about three hundred children looked up at him. "You think you don't belong here, he? You think you are made to be evil, but I tell you, even the folks that I send to Slytherin are not made to be evil, because nobody is ever, and remember my words, made to be evil."

The sorting hat seemed to be kind of exhausted from his emotional speech because he was huffing in Remus's ear and now the boy had no choice as to nod, regarding that the hat didn't seem to want to continue unless he did so.

"I can see that you are to endure a lot in your life, but also that you have the possibilities to stand through all of it and be a great friend and protector to others. You might not think you belong here, but I believe you belong into…"

"GRYFFINDOR" the hat shouted out loud, and suddenly there were faces again, and sounds of applause and the young werewolf was all but shoved towards a long table with a lot of people patting him on his back, some of them not lightly. 

And suddenly Remus Lupin had the great urge to grin and to laugh and to cry at the same time, so he settled to the former. And it happened to be that his mouth widened to the toothiest grin he recalled to ever be expressed by himself while his face was turned towards two boys, one of them having hair standing out in all directions and too large glasses and the other being pale as the full moon, and they almost immediately grinned back at him.

-

"Sirius Black," said the strict looking witch, who had guided them into Hogwarts great hall, out loud in a tone, that was so authoritarian, that the addressed boy almost flinched. He was one of the first children to be sorted and started to walk slowly towards, what seemed to be the gallows to him.

They want you in Slytherin, he thought to himself, everybody wants you to be in Slytherin. 

Except for this James guy, a sudden thought sprang to his mind. They had met earlier in the train and hadn't been able to stop talking since regardless of this annoying grease haired guy they had shared the compartment with.

James had, without a hint of doubt voiced, that the only house he ever wanted to be in was Gryffindor ‘just like his dad', but if he had to choose between the others, anything would be better than Slytherin.

‘We know he's got to end up in Slytherin, just like a good Black does,' the voice of Sirius mother piped up in his head. It had been one of these common occasions where the boy had to dress up nicely, stand next to his mother and listen to her talk about him to strangers. 

I hate her, he thought with a sudden clearness as he sat down on the three-legged chair and was taken aback by this so much, that he didn't notice the hat until it covered his eyes.

"Well, well, well, what do we have here," a loud, old-sounding voice echoed in his head. At first, he thought the hat had spoken out loud, but he didn't remember it doing so with the first kids, so it was probably just inside his head. This could come in handy, Sirius thought and almost smirked, but remembered in the last second, that every damn student of Hogwarts was staring at him.

"I've met a lot of Blacks in my career," the hat continued, and the boy under it froze in his thoughts. "But never was one so troublesome as you. And so brave in his heart, but still, you are a Black. This is not an easy one."

"If I may…" the young Black thought and started again a bit more insistent. "If I may, mighty hat of sorting, I am not just a Black."

He didn't feel brave or true-hearted at that moment. He felt like he did a lot of times as if his tongue slipped, and he would regret this sooner or later. As if his mother would come around the corner every second now, drag him off that chair and lock him in his room for a month.

"Well, what can I say there. I think something in the lines of…"

"GRYFFINDOR," the hat shouted out loud, and the second it was yanked from his small form, the boy's eyes connected with James from the train earlier, who grinned and even though he hadn't felt like smiling before, he did now and everything, from the glittering candles to the marble beneath his feet seemed to shine like a thousand diamonds.

James was sorted to Gryffindor seemingly just a short time after Sirius, and this time both of them even laughed happily as they sat next to each other. 

The boy on the opposite bench of them, who had been sorted some time in between suddenly lifted his head, as if having been in a trance-like state and Sirius witnessed the birth of the most honest and face lighting grin, he had seen in his life.

He couldn't stop himself. "Hi I'm Sirius," he said, extending his hand for the other boy to shake.

The addressed all but stared at his outstretched hand for a few seconds as if he was still a little bit in a haze and then took it with his own slightly shaking one. "Remus," he said, adjusting to Sirius style of introduction. "And this is Peter." He pointed at a small hunched-over boy to his left.

"Well, this is James," Sirius chuckled and extended a hand towards his new friend from the train before this one could do anything but blink.

"Nice to meet you, James," the Remus boy said and was that a hint of sarcasm in his voice, the young Black wondered. James answer was silenced by the sound of a fork meeting glass.

The old man with the long white beard and pinkish robes, who Sirius remembered being called ‘Albus Dumbledore' and ‘pathetic' by his parents, rose from his seat.

He welcomed them and then spoke almost five minutes about his top three of favourite bubble-gum flavours. Sirius blinked.

The next moment the plates in front of them were filled with food as well as lots of bowls, that just appeared out of nothing. Even though he came from a rather rich family, Sirius eyes went wide, but not nearly as round and glistening as the boy's before him. Remus, he remembered.

Talking to James and loading his plates with more and more food, the young Black glanced over at Remus, what he thought was in a subtle way. From the light brown hair, over the scars and the shabby cloak he still had draped tightly around his shoulders, the kid seemed like one of the paintings, that hung in Grimmauld place; one could regard it for hours and never quite catch every detail.

"Have you seen that red-haired girl on the train?" James asked next to him with at least three different kinds of food in his mouth and startled him out of his thoughts. "I heard her name is Lily Evans and she is in Gryffindor as well!"

He said it with so much excitement that Sirius didn't have the heart to inform him, that they had been sitting with her and her greasy friend for almost all of the ride and she hadn't really been fond of James, even if he really had tried to impress her.

"I remember her stupid friend with an aversion for showers," he shot back and looked over at the Slytherin table where said boy was seated. I almost ended up there as well, a voice in his head mumbled, but he shut it.

James frowned but Sirius didn't even really look at him. He had other matters in mind.

"Where did ya get all those scars from?" he asked the boy called Remus opposite of him. The addressed Gryffindor froze in his movements and looked slowly up from his plate where he had been picking up some mushrooms. When he didn't answer immediately, Sirius continued and scolded himself internally for his boldness, since nobody else would. "I mean, they seem pretty badass; did you fall off the broom into a field of bewitched roses or something?"

Next to him, James flinched, and Sirius wondered how long it would take for him to displease these people too much to get rid of them like he always wondered with his family.

"No," the boy finally spoke and looked at his scarred hands, as if he saw them for the first time. "My mom's a Muggle, and we've been in a car accident when I was little. My dad had been away for work reasons, so muggle hospital it was."

At the end of his sentence, he looked Sirius right in the eye as if to say: ‘do you wanna fight about it?' and both pure-bloods had a rather confused expression on their face.

"Oh," Sirius said much too late, and Remus started eating again.

-

After dinner and the obligatory explanation of the rules by a prefect, the only four Gryffindor first-year boys were heading for their shared dormitory.

"This one's mine," the feisty boy, that had been introduced to Remus as James all but shouted as soon as he was through the doors. He was so awake and bubbly that the young werewolf was taken aback for a second but also felt something prickle beneath his skin as if he was bitten by a thousand ants at the same time.

The bed, James had claimed to be his was the one left to the door, and as he heaved his trunk on it, not regarding the others, the black-haired boy called Sirius turned to the bed right of the door. "You don't mind, do you?" he asked the other two boys politely, and when both of them shook their heads, he turned around again.

This was weird, Remus thought. From the second, he had laid eyes on that Sirius in the great hall, he had classified him as an overly eager person with no sense of boundaries. The question about the scares hat shocked the werewolf so much that he had thought for a moment he would be cast out of the castle after just having had his first bite. But the others seemed to have accepted his answer, even Peter, who he knew of having one muggle parent.

Spoken of whom, the smaller boy had turned to him with a questioning expression on his face and Remus offered him a small smile.

"Just take whichever you want," Remus offered quietly, and Peter just turned where he stood and headed for the bed next to James. That leaves me to sleep between weird, moody guy and Peter, the werewolf thought and lowered himself on his bed. 

He had decided to enjoy every second he was at this place for it could be over as soon as it had started and regarding the other boys, James, who didn't seem to able to shut up for one second, Sirius, who listened to him intensely with a mischievous glint to his eyes and Peter, who stared at James as if he was her majesty herself, Remus found himself charmed by their sheer carefreeness.

"Remus, what do you say," Sirius suddenly asked after what could have been seconds as well as hours. At the other's confused expression, the boy continued. "We want to hex all the chairs in the common room to scream as soon as you sit on them. James says he has done this a thousand times already. Are you coming?"

James seemed to look rather sheepishly at that as if to say: ‘well maybe not a thousand times…' and Remus was not convinced.

I cannot allow myself to be caught doing forbidden stuff, because they already have one big reason to throw me out, was what the werewolf wanted to say. "What if we get caught?" he settled to ask instead cautiously.

The two dark-haired boys looked as if this thought had never crossed their minds during all of their plotting. Great.

"We don't have to think about that, because we won't be caught," James said, so sure of his words, that even Peter nodded along. But this was not what convinced Remus.

Because after looking at those two, his eyes wandered to the pale, dark-haired boy called Sirius, who had a big smile on his face and large pleading, grey eyes.

And from that moment on, Remus knew: He would never be able to deny those three anything.

-

The first full moon was surprisingly normal. Remus was guided down to the shrieking shack through the passage beneath the whomping willow by a rather young woman who had told him to call her Madam Pomfrey, even if she couldn't be older than twenty. She seemed to be strict but very worried at the same time, and Remus liked her already.

The wolf howled, the wolf bit and scratched itself and the wolf tore the interior of its small prison apart until it fell asleep in the morning. 

Remus thought he should have felt some shame, as same Madam Pomfrey got him early the next day and helped him limp to the hospital wing, but she showed so few pities, that he rather concentrated on things like the damage done.

He got a few new scars on his chest, but luckily none where the other boys could see them. He was very careful in disguising himself inside their dormitory, and it had worked very well so far, even if the others didn't seem to have any sense of boundaries regarding that matter.

Laying back in his pillows, the werewolf chuckled at that thought. Let's see how many moons it will be, shall we?


	2. The second Year (Part I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Friends.  
> Remus had never expected to have those, and even less to have them tell their darkest secrets, at night, when only the stars can hear them.  
> But what if they find out his secret, his dangerous, twisted second nature, that no sane person would not run away from immediately?

They had grown together Remus realized as he left Kings Cross station that summer in his mothers' car. His dad couldn't be there, some vampire business or something but it didn't matter because the young werewolf's heart stayed at the big castle in Scotland. 

If he was to summarize his first year at Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry, Remus would mention all the pranks, they had played, some of them he hadn't approved, but he was always only able to prevent the worst. They had laughed so much, and they had also studied, but it was really hard to motivate James and especially Sirius if there wasn't any mischief involved.

By missing at least two whole days every month and being sick a lot of times, Remus got behind with schoolwork quite fast, and he sometimes envied the two pure-bloods of their group to whom the magic just seemed to come completely naturally.

They also made a lot of good-hearted fun of James during the year because he often tried and failed to speak to that red-haired girl, Lily Evans, he had met the first day in the train. She seemed to think he was a complete prat and rather spend time with her best friend Severus Snape from Slytherin, who James and Sirius without further ado gave the name ‘Snivellus' to.

Most of this was stuff Remus had to leave out when his mother all but investigated him on the car drive home. They had seen each other the last time during the Christmas break, and she wanted to know everything, especially if he had done anything dangerous.

He told her that no, he hadn't played Quidditch with his friends and no, he didn't go swimming in the lake, even if the last weeks had been very hot and he had watched his friends do exactly that from a secure distance.

He hadn't been thrown out, his grades hadn't been too bad, but the biggest revelation of that first year at Hogwarts was, that he had actually managed to become friends with not one, not two, but three people and he had never thought something like this was possible for him.

‘He is a monster now, isn't he?' the words of his mother right after his first transformation rang still clear in his head, even if it had been five years. She hadn't meant for them to be heard by him and she probably still didn't know, but she had been right.

I am a monster, Remus thought. But maybe I don't have to be lonely.

-

They had grown together Sirius realized as soon as he entered number 12 Grimmauld Place trailing behind some servant, who had brought him home since Walburga and Orion couldn't be seen catching their Gryffindor son from the train. Home, he thought. This doesn't feel like home.

From the moment his parents had gotten the news of his sorting, they had punished him with silence. That was hurtful but alright since he had a lot of things to distract him, but when they had ordered him to stay at Hogwarts over the Christmas break because they were ‘visiting some family members', Sirius had spent the weeks grief-stricken, sitting in silence and wishing he was anybody else, anybody. Even Snivellus would have done.

Of course, his friends would have wanted to stay with him, but since their parents actually cared for their sons, he had said he would also go home, but a little later.

Now he entered this ‘home' for the first time in almost a year and awaited with knots in his guts to be welcomed or cast out.

"Hello, Sirius," the voice of his younger brother Regulus sounded through the dark corridor. Oh, the good son; Sirius tried to keep the bitterness out of his thoughts. "They await you for dinner," he continued when the older Black didn't react. "But you can put your stuff in your room first."

Sirius approached him and gritted his teeth. The younger boy wasn't much shorter than himself anymore, and Sirius realized with a shock, that both of them would attend Hogwarts next year.

"Regulus," Sirius started, not having tasted this sound in his mouth for some time. "You know, you don't have to play their butler, do you?"

"You... you haven't been here," the younger brother uttered in a low voice, but Sirius was sure the walls had ears anyways. "They have changed." 

There was so much determination and pride in his brother's eyes that Sirius didn't know how to break it to him. How to tell him that their parents would never change, that they would always hate muggles and treat themselves as royalty. That they would always hurt those, who wouldn't obey or didn't fit their world view if mentally or physically. And that they had only stopped abusing the youngest Black because he stopped rebelling and adapted to their wishes.

So he just shook his head and climbed up the stairs to his room.

It seemed to be exactly as he had left it, everything seemed to be exactly as he had left it and still…

He had changed, Sirius realized, and it felt like the gears clicking into their right place. He was not Sirius Black from before Hogwarts anymore, he was a new Sirius Black, one that had awesome friends and loved to play pranks as long as none who didn't deserve it was seriously hurt, and he didn't give a damn anymore. He didn't care about getting any appreciation from his parents or any other adult anymore, and he was determined to make it his goal for the summer to show this to everybody.

This will be fun, he thought at dinner and pictures of his room plastered in everything red and gold he could find flashed across his mind.

"Sirius," his mother suddenly said, and he was so startled at that, that he all but dropped his fork onto his plate.

"As you are here," Walburga Black continued as if she hadn't seen her sons display of surprise and as if he didn't have to be here. "We wanted to inform you that you are expected to attend the Lestrange wedding on Saturday. And I expect you to behave."

The last sentence was added with so much venom to her voice, that Sirius almost flinched. As he didn't answer Orion Black voiced a strict: "Did you hear, boy?" and he nodded.

In his mind, this encounter meant that he had only agreed that he had heard about the expectations of him to behave, not that he had agreed to do what he was told. He still would have to go with his family to that stupid wedding, and he dreaded that day already with grief.

It was going to be horrible, there would be his cousin Bellatrix of course, who was to be wed and her little sister Narcissa with this dumb boyfriend Lucius of hers. Narcissa had been attending Hogwarts for her seventh year last year, and Sirius had ignored her as much as possible, what wasn't hard, because she had done the same thing.

The only person besides maybe his brother, whose presence Sirius could endure was his cousin Andromeda, who to his enjoyment had married a muggle-born called Ted Tonks or something, but to his regret had been cut out of the family's history. They weren't even allowed to talk about her, and even if Sirius just didn't have the one nice person to talk to at family occasions anymore, Narcissa and Bellatrix must have lost a sister and the young Black couldn't imagine what that felt like.

Even if he wasn't close with his brother and his brother would probably hate him one day for his rebellions, he was still his brother.

This was gonna be a long summer, Sirius thought and sighted, what resulted in his mother all but screaming at him to sit straight.

-

_Dear Remus,_

_I'm writing to you from the wedding of my cousin because I will probably not be allowed to write any more letters when I come home. For at least a week._

_James told me he misses us, well he probably wrote to you as well, and we have been suggesting, or maybe plotting, how we could let everybody know we're back after the summer break. I think that confused owls at breakfast would be a nice, round thing. Just imagine how everybody gets the wrong mail and has to shout through the great hall for the owner of the package that landed in front of them._

_I'm writing this to you mostly so you can get used to the idea and then vote for my plan and not for Potters, which I will not further mention here._

_How are you doing at your parents? Are your holidays as boring as mine or are you visiting wizards Funland and playing Quidditch all day like James does._

_Please don't worry, if I don't write for the rest of the summer, since I already said, this wedding will lead to many problems, one way or another, but if I don't end up in the Hogwarts train on the fist of September, just assume I'm dead and hold me in great honour._

_Maybe you could hold a memorial for me and make sure everybody wins exploding snap against James in that manner._

_Well, I think that's either farewell or goodbye, my friend._

_In hope of seeing you again,_

_Sirius_

Remus stared at the letter in his hand.

He was currently laying on his bed with a lot of pillows beneath his head since the full moon yesterday got him bad. It kind of was harder here now, because he knew his parents worried a lot and they showed it in contrast to Madam Pomfrey.

He also missed his friends a lot, and they only had left Hogwarts a week ago.

_Dear Sirius,_

_Summer is pretty boring so far since my parents regard Funland as a far too dangerous destination for a trip._

Also, we're kind of poor, because my family got cast out of wizarding society because I'm a werewolf and it's not easy for my dad to find a job, Remus thought but didn't write.

_Oh, I really hope you are still alive and will receive this letter since it would be way too much work to find a new person to keep James from talking for two seconds. On the other hand, I could probably trade your trunk and its content at Hogwarts for some chocolate, so…_

Sirius was being dramatic as always, what meant that it couldn't be that bad. Even if Remus believed without a doubt, that his parents would ground him if he didn't do what they said at the family meeting. What would probably exactly be the case since it was Sirius, they were talking about.

_Tell me all the horrible details of this Black's family encounter as soon as you get out of prison and don't forget the weird aunt/uncle stories._

_I am currently sick, but you know the way it is. Some nice soup and a few days of bed rest and I will be good as new and will have probably read five books in that time. I miss you lot, too and have to admit that it's pretty boring to not constantly trying to stop you and James from getting into trouble._

_Of course, James wrote to me, he wants to brag about his exciting life as much as possible._

_Your beloved, suffering sharing friend,_

_Remus_

-

It wasn't until four weeks into the summer break that Remus heard from his friend Sirius Black again. It wasn't until an owl with a letter labelled in Sirius elegant handwriting landed outside his window, that he was to breathe freely again. 

He wondered if, behind the light joking of his friend, there had been some truth. But his parents couldn't really hurt him, could they? He didn't really write about the wedding, just that it been boring and Remus refused from pressing on, even if he really wanted to.

From this letter on, they wrote every second day, also with the other two and started plotting all the pranks they would pull over the next year. 

Remus parents fought less, but also talked less as if the worry about their son had been the biggest reason to communicate before he left. They also talked to Dumbledore again, he heard them in the living room but didn't know if the headmaster was actually there or found some other way. Dumbledore had told them he could go to Hogwarts for another year. All three Lupins cried that night.

It was the ride to the King's Cross station, right the day after another full moon, that Remus realized, that he, despite loving his parents, would rather be at Hogwarts for the most of his time. Only a few more hours and he would see his friends again.

The Lupins' arrival at the train was as always hectic, and the now twelve-year-old werewolf made it through the door just in time for the second warning whistle.

He almost ran through the train as it started to find his friends, and he would have passed their compartment if James hadn't stuck his head out the door.

"Remus," he said with the usual easy grin on his face. "We were already wondering if you got lost."

The addressed boy just chuckled out of breath and after entering, dropped himself down on the bench next to Peter.

"Man, you look like shit," the boy Remus had to admit he had missed the most stated in his blunt way. Sirius sat at the window on the other bench and had started to let his dark hair grow over the summer. It fit the troublesome-boy look he was hinting at and let his skin shimmer even whiter. 

The other boys, Remus realized now hadn't changed much, just Peter had a new haircut, and James' hair seemed to be more lost than ever.

Regarding what Sirius had said, Remus drew his cloak closer around his body and took a shaky breath. It was still the day after the full moon, and the young werewolf felt exactly like that, like shit, but he had decided and insisted, that he would come to Hogwarts like everybody else. 

Yeah, should be in bed right now, he wanted to answer but couldn't.

"Oh, why, that's very nice of you, Sirius," he said instead. "I missed the lot of you as well."

James snickered at that and Peter joined in, but Sirius just crooked his head and stared at his friend with his big grey eyes, as if he was some mystery that was to be solved. Hopefully, he would never manage to.

"I was just telling the two fellas here," James said and pointed at Peter and Sirius, "that my plan of introduction to the first years would be to hex all of their schedules so they won't know where to go tomorrow."

Remus raised his brows and glanced over at Sirius, who winked at him. At that, the werewolf showed a small smile and turned around to face James, who was apparently unable to sit still for one second.

"Well, I think that bewitching the owls to confuse their destinies at the breakfast table would be a much nicer and easier way to show we're back. The schedules are probably bewitched by the teachers." Remus chuckled internally, but since he was a master of the poker face, it didn't show on the outside during his small speech.

As the two dark-haired boys continued to banter, Remus felt himself becoming comfortable and warm, and he noticed that his eyelids became harder to control with every passing minute.

It wasn't until Sirius addressed him though, that he noticed he had kept them shut for some time.

"Hey, Remus… Remus," the young Black said with a sorrowful look in his eyes. 

"Wha-, am awake," was apparently not a very convincing response.

"You know, you could just lay down. Peter, come over here so that sleeping beauty over there can get some shut-eye."

Peter obliged and Remus felt himself lay down and pull his cloak closer around his frame automatically.

"Thanks," was all he could mutter before he fell into a long, dreamless sleep.

-

"Something is wrong with Remus."

Both James and Peter stared at Sirius after that and then looked around for their shared friend. He wasn't in the common room and hadn't been seen since yesterday.

It was already two months in the school year when Sirius got enough evidence, that he would reveal his worry to the others. Remus had a secret and judging by everything the young Black had written down on the parchment he now extended ceremoniously it was not a good one.

"Well, he's Remus, he has a bad immune system," James said after reading phrases like ‘disappearances' and ‘being sick a lot' from the paper that was still upside down for him.

"But he doesn't just get a little sick," Sirius pressed on with so much determination to his voice, that the others were taken aback for a second. "He sometimes disappears for days, has done last year as well as you remember and when he comes back, he always looks like shit and sometimes limps. Did you notice him limping?"

Both boys seemed to consider that for a second and then nodded, having put their game-faces on. This is working better than expected, Sirius thought.

"So, what do we know?" James asked and turned the parchment around. Sirius had made two columns, one with all he had observed about the disappearances and one with the times their friend had been sick. The second column seemed pretty normal, even if ‘two to four times a month' seemed a bit much, but else there were just things like: ‘had a bad cough', ‘slept all day' and ‘missed two classes because in bed'.

The other, in contrast, was very worrisome. ‘Disappears about once a month for two to five days' seemed to be written very hastily to the top.

"Once in first year, he had said his mother was sick, and he didn't come back for a week," James prompted, and Sirius wrote it down. ‘Reappears with bad health.' ‘Reappears with a limp to his step.' ‘Reappears with a bandage to his hand.'

They continued like that for the next few hours but didn't get any closer to revealing the ‘Lupin secret' as they had named it. What do you hide, Remus, what do you hide?

-

There was something odd happening, Remus thought one evening in the library. He was used to going there alone since his friends hated studying and except for Peter also didn't really need to. Still, the last times he had seen the three of them, they had suddenly quieted or stuffed books under their pillows.

They were plotting something, and Remus didn't really know if he liked that. The last time one of them hadn't known of a prank it had been Peter, and he had ended up with pointy ears because of a bet. Remus liked his ears the way they were.

"Hey, ehm, do you mind if I sit with you," a girls voice suddenly uttered, and Remus must have flinched a little too much because when he looked up, Lily Evans stood before him with wide green eyes.

"Oh, eh, yeah, of course," Remus stammered. "I mean, no, I don't mind."

The read-headed girl sat down across from him and lowered her books to the table. She had like five very big ones, and Remus wondered if she really aimed to read all of them.

"I know who you are friends with," she said, and it sounded almost like an accusation. Knowing James and Sirius, it probably was. "But you're always sitting here alone."

Remus didn't really know what to say to that and squirmed a little under her intense stare. It was as if she was asking something like: ‘why the hell are you friends with these idiots.' Remus couldn't really hold this against her, they were annoying and ill-behaved and sometimes mean when they were around other people, but they would never let anything happen that could hurt their friends. And that's why Remus loved them.

"I saw you were missing today's Transfiguration class and I planned to go through it anyways now," she changed the subject as if she wanted to make him feel better. "If I explain it to you, it would help me to internalize it."

She was, as Remus suddenly realized, a really nice person. No idea how she deserved all that attention from James and Snape, because, no matter how much he loved him, James could really be an ass sometimes. And well, Snape, he didn't actually earn the bullying from Remus friends with his own behaviour, but the werewolf could say for sure, that he as well wasn't a very nice person since he bullied especially younger students himself.

"Well, that's, that's very nice of you," Remus finally managed to reply and tried to cover up the awkwardness with a cough, which turned into a full-on coughing fit, a remnant from his earlier illness.

"Here, take this," Lily urged, now a worried look to her face and handed him a small flacon with a green fluid inside. "Made it for potions as training, it's good for all kinds of throat and lung problems."

Remus accepted wordlessly and started to already feel better the moment the potion touched the back of his throat.

"Thanks," he said as soon as he was able to speak again. "They're not that bad, you know?"

At that, Lily just lifted her eyebrows and opened the transfiguration textbook.

-

Two weeks later all Sirius, James and Peter had archive so far was getting irritated glances from Remus when they discussed the matter in hushed tones.

"Nothing makes sense. Did you really check all the wizard and muggle diseases?" James asked for what felt like the tenth time.

"Yeah and it can't be any of them, the timing just isn't right," Sirius answered and let his head fall down onto the open book in his lap. They were currently sitting in their dormitory room on the floor while Remus was out in the library, studying, or whatever the idiot did there.

"We won't find out what's wrong with him if we don't keep searching," Peter voiced helpfully, and Sirius wanted to strangle him.

"Well, I don't know about you guys, but I'm stuck. Maybe a good night's sleep will do our exhausted brains a favour." Sirius also wanted to suffocate James for that statement at which Peter nodded eagerly, the bloody traitor, but he refrained from it since he was very tired himself.

"Goodnight then," Sirius said and, without looking at the others, turned around towards his bed and crawled under the blankets.

It was dark when he awoke for the next time.

Images of angry witches with dark, tousled hair swam before his eyes as if they had been burned into his retina. Can't. Calm. Down. Sirius thought as he blinked at the ceiling of his four-poster bed and tried to hold back the tears wailing up in his eyes. Need. Remus.

Just like the first time Sirius had had a nightmare in Hogwarts, he now climbed out of bed and into the one that was closest to him. Back then it had been an impulsion decision just out of the need of contact and warmth, but the young Black had learned very fast, that Remus was the one to turn to with your deeper problems since he always listened, never made fun of you and most importantly never told anyone else. 

Remus seemed to be still in a sleep-like trance when Sirius crawled under his sheets and pressed himself as close to the warm body as physically possible. A lot of people said he was a touchy person, what he solely ascribed to the way his family understood affection and he had been surprised how the others had easily adapted to this feature of his in the beginning. All except for Remus who seemed to enjoy light touches like a hand on the shoulder, but always flinched when Sirius squeezed him too hard. 

This was an emergency nightmare situation though and didn't require any forms of caution.

"Sirius?" Remus asked blearily and after apparently registering, that his friend wouldn't talk soon, cast a silencing spell over the bed to not wake the others.

Then he did the perfect thing because he always and in every situation seemed to know what the perfect thing to do was, and stroke Sirius black locks.

"Some chocolate?" he asked after some time in a hushed tone, even if the others couldn't hear them. Sirius nodded into the crook of Remus's neck and was handed a bar of chocolate the other probably kept in bed with himself. Maybe under his pillow.

The young Black's mood lifted immensely at the though of Remus laying in bed and munching chocolate in his sleep, and after a few bites, he felt actually able to speak.

"So, we were, we… We were at that wedding. Of my cousin Bellatrix, she is, she is a true Black, muggle-born hating and all that stuff." Sirius stretched his fingers over his friend's chest and then made a fist, over and over again.

"And they were all like, saying all this stuff at dinner and so on. That muggle-borns shouldn't be allowed in wizarding society and who the hell would give them wands, and they are so dumb and stuff. And then they went on in the same manner about half-bloods and half-breeds," Remus seemed to tense at that, maybe since his mother was a muggle and he, therefore, a half-blood, "like I don't even know what they meant."

"I don't think that way." Sirius felt like he had to say that, that he had to defend himself. As he looked up to see if the other believed him, he only saw openness and affirmation in amber eyes.

"Well, at some point I just couldn't take it anymore," Sirius continued and looked down at Remus probably-home-knitted blanked again. "I had been sitting there all day in these stupid dress gowns they gave me with a greenish touch to them, just nod and smile mildly, that was what I was ordered to do.

I think I just snapped. I knew it wouldn't end well, but at some point, I just got up and threw my pumpkin juice in Bellatrix direction."

Sirius rather felt than heard Remus chuckling and couldn't suppress a small smile himself.

"I could have gone for anything," the young Black muttered in Remus Pyjama shirt. "I could have let the chandeliers explode or bewitched their food to come alive, and what did I do instead? I got the bridal couple's hair wet with pumpkin juice."

"I would have liked to see that," Remus uttered in a low voice and Sirius sighed. It was good that his sickening friend hadn't been there after what had happened next. Sirius actually didn't want to talk about it, like ever, but he knew he wouldn't be able to go back to sleep if he didn't.

"So, well, then, my mother wanted to get me out of the sight of the people to punish me or stuff, but my dear cousin Bellatrix said she would handle it. And she did. She… she… at first, she tied a rope around a post and around me and then she hexed…" Sirius couldn't suppress a sob anymore, and he felt ashamed until Remus continued stroking his hair.

"She hexed my legs into goat legs and my hands into paws of a cat and she… she hexed a beak to my face and all the while she made fun of me and told my family how I wasn't brave, and Gryffindors were all just blood traitors and… and that I probably was friends with m… m… muggle-borns and half-bloods and after she was satisfied, my mother dragged me by my hair to my room and she… she didn't turn me back for a week."

For Sirius, it felt as if a boulder was lifted from his shoulders and he could breathe a little lighter. As he noticed, that the shirt beneath his cheek was wet, he rose his head and rubbed his eyes sheepishly.

Remus had a look of utter horror on his face.

"It was… it was not that bad you know, just-" Sirius tried to play it down, but apparently, Remus would have none of that.

"What are you talking about," he said through clenched teeth, a lot louder than before. "This is not- This is not all right; do you hear me? People are not allowed to torture other people, especially if they can't defend themselves. Especially if they're their family!"

But they did, Sirius wanted to scream but didn't, because he understood that life was not fair and that you couldn't choose the family that you were bound to by blood.

"One day, I will run away," Sirius muttered towards the bedsheet before the thought had even really formed in his head. "I don't have to be the way they want me."

"You're right, but please be careful, Sirius." The addressed lifted his head and grinned, feeling a little lightheaded.

"Always am, Remus. Always am."


	3. The second Year (Part II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, what do you do when your friend seems to behave weirdly and disappears at night?  
> Well, you follow him, of course!

It was the day before the next full moon when Remus left the library, so deeply engaged in a conversation with Lily about the latest curse they had learned about in defence against the dark arts, that he didn't notice all three of his friends standing at the stairs to their common room.

He actually hadn't wanted to go down into the cold, uncomfortable library, since his legs and back hurt as if someone was slowly breaking his bones, but the red-headed Gryffindor girl had convinced him. She had known a book, that illustrated a tincture they had to write an essay about for potions better than the textbook and since that was the subject Remus was the furthest behind, he had gridded his teeth, formed something with his face, that he thought was akin to a smile and had followed her down.

It was always like this shortly before the full moon, he had to sit in class or engage in conversations while the wolf already tried to get comfortable inside of him, driving his moods up and down and testing the stretch of his bones. And since his legs and back had to change the most, they hurt the most, but also his eyes felt dry, and he had to blink a lot, and his fingers sometimes weren't able to hold a quill.

There were also advances of the wolf's wakening, like the better hearing and the slightly elevated strength.

"Remus," Sirius said, and the werewolf looked up so quickly, that his head would have started to spin if it wasn't that exact day of the month. "Didn't know you talked to Evans."

It was almost picturesque, the way they stood there. Sirius, having positioned himself one step above the others had his brows knitted together as if he had a foul taste in his mouth, Peter slightly hunched over his folded hands looked from James to Lily to Remus and back and James had his eyes wide open, and his mouth gaped like a fish's trying to catch air when in need of water.

"I would say, that's none of your business, Black," Lily countered before Remus could even do as much as open his mouth in her straight forward and always defensive way. "But I would have to be talking to you for that."

Now Remus joined the others in staring at her, and he suddenly understood, in a simple, platonic way, why James was head over heels for her. She simply was amazing.

"Goodnight, Remus," she said when nobody else filled the silence and then leaned in and kissed Remus on the cheek. He knew she probably did it to annoy James who sometimes trailed after her for hours or even Sirius and he also knew they had only started to get to know each other for the last few weeks, but it still felt like a great honour to be cherished by such a nice and wonderful person.

Remus hadn't noticed he had smiled after her leaving form until Sirius was suddenly in his face.

"What are you thinking?" the dark-haired boy asked from a slightly crouched position to see into his opponent's face and with a lot of psycho glint in his eyes. He normally only got that look when he was very angry or plotted a legendary prank and Remus would have lied if it didn't scare him a little. "You know, that James likes her, look at how devastated he is."

At his last words, Sirius pointed towards their shared friend with a big, dramatic movement of his arm and Remus felt a lift of the spirit because of the others silly behaviour. James, on the other hand, actually looked devastated, which caused a chuckle in all other present Gryffindor boys.

"Don't worry," Remus started and cleared his throat because he suddenly felt the wolf pull on his vocal cords. "I have no intention in following Lily around all day and trying to talk to her but never managing."

He really wanted to reassure everybody and calm the waves, so he had the great idea to step forward and playfully lay a hand on James' shoulder, but he didn't make it that far. The moment he lowered his left leg back on the ground, white, hot explosions of pain shot through his entire body, and he stumbled.

Luckily for him, Sirius stood right next to him and caught him, but unfortunately, he had a distinct look of worry and suspicion on his face.

"Are you all right?" James asked, having forgotten all about mysterious redheads and started fussing over Remus like a mother hen. The addressed boy closed his eyes, willed the sparks away and took a deep breath.

"Yeah, I'm… okay. But I think I will go to the hospital wing, just to make sure."

The last part Remus added because James and Peter didn't loosen the worried looks and Sirius didn't seem to think of letting him go anytime soon.

"Fine," Sirius suddenly said and earned an irritated look from everybody else. "I'll go with you."

-

"And?" James was in Sirius face the minute he entered the dormitory.

"We actually went to the hospital wing, and I left him with Madam Pomfrey, who seemed to know exactly what is wrong with him without doing so much as examining him," Sirius said and drew a hand through his long locks, he had started to grow very fond of. Especially because they annoyed his mother.

"So, what do we do?" Peter asked from the middle of his bed, where he sat, stuffing a chocolate frog in his mouth like he did when things got stressful. Sirius mind, on the other hand, was crystal clear and focused right now.

"We go down and observe them, of course."

It took a very short time to convince the other two boys of his plans and just thirty minutes later Sirius, James and Peter stood under James invisibility cloak in front of the hospital wing. None of the boys had ever understood how Mr Potter thought it was a good idea to hand a cloak that made you invisible to his son who always got in trouble for the start of his first Hogwarts year. They all had to silently thank the man, though because half of their pranks wouldn't be possible without it.

"Do you see them? "Sirius asked James in a rather loud whisper, who was currently peeking through a slit of the door.

"Yeah, they are talking I think, eh, Remus has his head bowed, and he sits on a bed, and now, oh, they are heading for us, quick, back, back, back!"

The three boys stumbled back and then stood as still as possible as the big doors to the hospital wing opened. Luckily Remus and Madam Pomfrey headed the opposite direction of where they stood, and after a few seconds, they dared to breathe again.

"We should follow them," Sirius said and earned horrified looks from the others and then nods. 

Sometimes Sirius thought, that he had this weird talent he had never wanted, where everybody listened to what he said and did as he wanted however strange it seemed. Hopefully, this was a good idea.

They headed down some corridors and then they were suddenly out on the Hogwarts grounds and could see the star-sprinkled sky above. The air was cold since it was early December and Sirius was lost a few seconds in the darkness of it all. But then suddenly the clouds shifted and partly revealed the bright shining moon. 

In the light of it, two figures were recognizable on their way down the hill. They halted for a second and then continued in a more hurried step.

"Where are they heading?" Peter asked as he tried to catch up with the others under the confined space of the cloak. All of them were kind of stumbling on the uneven ground, some more graceful than others.

"The Whomping Willow," James suddenly said and stopped so abruptly, that Peter ran into him. The tree that every student avoided moved furiously until Madam Pomfrey lifted her wand cast a spell, and it was suddenly immobile.

Then the three friends watched as both figures vanished into a hole between the roots and the tree started to move again.

"How will we… how do we get through… this?" was what Sirius heard from his left. But he needed to concentrate. He needed to understand what was going on since none of this made any sense. Remus had clearly been hurting earlier, why would Madam Pomfrey bring him away from the hospital wing and apparently into some secret passage or something? How should that help his pain? Were they heading to St. Mungos?

These few questions multiplied to a thousand when they watched the tree go immobile again, and one figure emerge from the hole. Not two, just one.

The three boys stood as if frozen to the ground as a dishevelled Madam Pomfrey headed their way and passed them in a fast and vigorous step.

Remus was alone, was all Sirius could think. He was alone in that passage or cave or something, and suddenly a loud howl echoed through the night, and it couldn't be save to leave a twelve-year-old out in the cold darkness with everything looming in the shadows.

"Should we… go find Remus?" Peter asked, and the pure thought seemed to scare him so much that he started to shiver.

"I don't know, I mean if Madam Pomfrey thought this was a good idea…?"

Sirius had emerged the safety of the cloak without a word and without thinking. He knew the answer was right there as if it was sitting on his tongue, but he couldn't reach it, as if his mind was filled with cotton and his body was unreactive to his thoughts. He barely even registered, that the other boys had put the cloak aside and followed him.

A second howl made all of them stop in their tracks, and Sirius heard the blood rush in his head in the following silence.

"He probably does this every time, they seemed very used to this," James spoke, and his voice was thin and scared.

"Yeah, he… remember, he disappears once… once a month, probably in the same way." Peter.

Once a month. They now stood almost in reach of the Whomping Willow, and it furiously tried to hit them.

Then Sirius looked up towards the big, full moon.

"He normally disappears at the same time of the month, doesn't he?" the young Black asked just above a whisper, not believing what they were about to discover. "And he has all these scars…"

"What are you hinting at?" It was Peter who voiced the thought, but James had a similarly irritated look on his face when Sirius turned around.

"What things do you know combine the full moon with scars and limps and pain and howls," Sirius asked, and he knew he must sound completely crazy and have this insane glint to his eyes, his friends always mocked him with.

"Well, I mean the full moon and howls would be werewolves, but what-"

Sirius watched the exact second it hit James.

Werewolves. Their friend was a werewolf, no other explanation.

"What do you mean, there are werewolves in the forest, but what does this have to do with Remus?" Peter was still struggling with his panic.

"He's a werewolf," Sirius said and laughed because the pure thought had seemed so unbelievable just hours ago. "They take him to somewhere every full moon, where he can transform safely." He paced now, back and forth. "But where does he get the scars from then, that doesn't make any sense…"

James blinked as if his mind was still grasping the sheer fact that their friend could have been hiding such a huge thing.

"I don't know, maybe they put him in a closed space and the wolf-form doesn't like that. Like a caged animal." The two dark-haired boys stared at each other, and the younger one must have seen something in the other's eyes that made him lift his hands in a defensive pose.

"Sirius, no. We are not going to try to get to him. Even if we manage to pass the tree alive, what I really doubt, he could kill us, if he is what you say. And he would never forgive himself for doing that, you know him."

The last part was the one that convinced Sirius to refrain from the plan forming in his head, and he nodded shortly.

"We should head back," James said, and Peter looked at him like he was Merlin himself.

"But we will go to the hospital wing tomorrow and ask him." Sirius would not move until the other two confirmed, and as they climbed back up the hill, he turned around a few times, listening to the howls dying away in the distance.

-

When Remus awoke after the full moon, it was always with a start, never knowing for the first few seconds where he was or why he was aching all over.

This time wasn't different, and the boy wondered when he would ever get used to the white sheets of the hospital wing. He didn’t have much time to dwell in his thoughts this time though, because Madam Pomfrey all but hurried towards him as soon as she had noticed him stirring.

“Mr Lupin,” she said in a flustered tone and deposited some potions absentminded on Remus bedside table. “They just won’t go away. I keep telling them, that you are in no condition to be visited since they already insisted, they _knew_ you were here, but they just said, they will stay in front of the door until I let them in.”

“Who?” Remus asked, even though he already knew that nobody else would be that disrespectful regarding authority just to see him.

“These boys, Black and Potter and the small one… Pettigrew.”

Even if he knew, that people normally liked it, when friends visited them in the hospital, Remus only felt fear at the thought of letting them in. He didn’t want them to see him this weak and immobile and not at all the way he wanted to be.

“Let them in,” he croaked nonetheless. They were still his friends, and he was sure they wouldn’t leave unless being dragged away.

The first one, who came into vision after Remus had sat himself up against the pillows not without struggle was Sirius, face set into a determined expression. At the sight of his friend, his eyes softened though and the other two coming in after him had concerned, friendly-looking faces.

“Hello, Remus,” Sirius said and didn’t smile in contrast to the others but suddenly dropped a huge bar of chocolate onto his friend's lap.

Remus didn’t know what to do for a second, but when nobody else reacted, he opened the bar reluctantly and took a large bite. The sweet taste calmed his nerves immediately, and he would have sworn it also worked as a pain killer. Having apparently waited for the boy in the bed to finish eating the bite, Sirius started to speak again, and Remus wondered briefly why the other two were so silent. He found out the next moment.

“We know, you’re a werewolf.” There was no hint of emotion in his voice, and Remus scanned the other people in the room instead. Madam Pomfrey had a shocked expression on her face and comically cupped her mouth with her hands, while James still hadn’t loosened the small smile he had been wearing since he came in and Peter looked towards the floor as if done something wrong.

None of them looked scared, though.

“Aren’t you afraid?” Remus asked and felt a sudden anger boil in him he hadn’t expected. He would lie if he would claim to have never imagined the day they found out, or he told them, but in every scenario, there had been fear or at least disgust in various states in facial expressions.

“Afraid?” James repeated hollowly the same moment Sirius determined look shifted into a confused, angry one.

“Dude, you read books,” Sirius said as if the other had never said anything that stupid before. “You like chocolate and knitted blankets.”

“You always wear your tie correctly.” James. “You tidy up your bed every morning.” Peter.

“Yes, we are afraid,” that was Sirius again, and Remus glance shifted back toward him. He swore his heart was beating way too fast. “We are afraid of you hurting or dying or thinking so less of us that you wouldn’t tell us!”

In the end, the dark-haired boy almost shouted, and the silence that followed felt nearly deafening.

“Okay.” Remus didn’t know what else to say. It was finally out in the open, but the reality felt like wrapped in a thick layer of cotton right now.

“Well, if it’s all settled then,” Madam Pomfrey piped up, behind the three boys and made her way to Remus bed, “I would suggest you let the young man sleep since he is still very exhausted. You can come back in the evening _after_ your classes.”

James, Peter and Sirius nodded simultaneously, and the latter’s face suddenly split into a room-lightening grin.

“See you later then,” he said and followed the others out.

-

Things were easier from then on if one asked a boy called Remus Lupin. There had been this nagging voice in his head, that told him, that nobody could ever really like him, because nobody could ever know of his dark sides. Now there were these three boys who knew, and it seemed as if the four of them had grown even closer after this particular full moon.

They all went home this year for Christmas, and if Remus came back after one week, just before the next full moon to not burden his parents and spend it in the shack and found Sirius sitting in their common room, staring at the flames of the fireplace, he didn’t say anything but sat silently beside him.

And if Sirius asked for lunch for Remus in the kitchen and took it to his bed on the day of the full moon, since the other boy couldn’t move because of the wolf and promised to do so for the rest of their Hogwarts career, nobody mentioned it.

“How are you doing?” Sirius asked, having curled himself into a ball on the foot of the hospital bed a day later and refusing to leave.

“Have been worse,” Remus answered and flinched since his voice still felt like he had howled the whole night or something. He took a sip of his herbal tea and couldn’t help but smile at the sleepy form on top of his blankets. “You know, I should be the tired one?”

“Couldn’t sleep last night.” A shrug. “Some howling in the woods kept me awake.”

When James and Peter came back after the break and Remus had another bad scar on his lower arm, they just threw the Christmas chocolate their parents had packed them at him, and James started an extensive narrative of how he had tried out the new broom he had gotten this year.

It was just… easier. Of course, the transformations would never stop, Sirius would never be treated better by his family and to leave each other would even be harder this year, but for the first time since he could remember, and he could not remember anything before the bite, Remus life felt manageable.

Normal.


	4. The third Year (Part I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thei third year in Hogwarts, of course, doesn't end the mischief and the four boys grow closer as they find new ways to have fun and prank people. In addition to this a read headed girl prooves to be smart and the wolf has apparently decided to make Remus life even more difficult.

“Fleamont Potter,” the dark-haired wizard introduced himself and shook Lyall Lupins hand. “And you must be Remus. James has told me so much about you and your friends.”

Mr Potter reached out his hand for the thirteen-year-old boy, who had been partly covered by his mother, heaving his trunk into the train. The moment their eyes met, the older man involuntarily flinched, but the boy just acted as if not having noticed.

“Nice to meet you, Sir,” he said, shook the other’s hand and tried to ignore his staring. Assimilating. He was slowly Assimilating.

James, who had been busy getting rid of his stuff, joined the group of three grown wizards, a muggle and a boy who were clad in awkward silence a few moments later.

“Have you seen Peter?” James asked his friend, and the addressed boy could see in his face, that he was at least trying not to stare. Assimilate.

As Remus shook his head, he suddenly recognized a face in the crowd, that came their way fast. As Sirius spotted him, his eyes went wide, he had now entered their group, and Remus repeated a sentence in his head for the other to hear via mental connection. Please don’t say anything, _please don’t say anything._

“Bly me, Remus,” Sirius said, and everybody in the group turned to him. The adults had various stated of horrified expressions on their faces, and James was making movements to slide his throat. He wouldn’t do it, would he?

“You have grown your hair!”

Remus let out his breath and could find the sparkle of mischief in his friend’s eyes. They would get back to that.

Suddenly Remus mother noticed who Sirius had come with and let out a kind of astonished sound. The “Hello” she managed to utter in the direction of the Black’s house-elf was met with angry muttering.

“No, no, Kreacher must not speak to filthy muggles and blood-traitors,” he said while dragging Sirius trunk to the next train assistant. “In the mighty house of Black these are not viewed as fitting associations.”

“Behave, Kreacher,” Sirius shouted after him in an annoyed voice. “I’m sorry about him,” he continued after turning around and smiled this wide, disarming smile of his. “He doesn’t leave the house too often.”

“We should enter the train,” Remus voiced to get rid of the invisible tension and was crushed into a hug by his mother immediately. He also hugged his dad, promised to not do anything dangerous, besides turning into a monster once a month, and noticed how none of his parents were able to look into his eyes.

Everybody uttered their goodbyes and promises to write (Sirius told Mrs Potter, he’d send her a photograph of her son once a week), and they entered the train.

“Oi, I’ve seen your parents over there,” panted a quite sweaty Peter upon entering their group. “Thought you were with them.”

“That’s where it went wrong, the part with you thinking,” Sirius retorted and stalked ahead of them all to not be bothered further and with the great goal of finding a department for them. Remus found he was a little sorry for the smaller boy, since he couldn’t know much about Sirius problems with his parents, but then he turned to him and _stared_.

It took the small, blond boy until they settled down in an empty department to find the composure to ask. “How did… how did you get these?” He made a movement around his face as if they all didn’t already know what he meant. To Remus disappointment, none of the others jumped in and told him to shut up since they were alone now.

Remus sighed and remembered how he had seen the new scars in his face for the first time a few weeks ago. They looked as if someone had dragged a five-fingered hand with very sharp claws across the surface and that was of course, exactly what had happened.

“I don’t know, don’t remember much,” the young werewolf lied and didn’t have to look up to know that Sirius didn’t believe him. “The wolf doesn’t seem to want me getting any social connection in my life ever. Or he just hates my face.”

“You don’t know that,” Sirius's voice piped up from next to him. “The scars give you a real bad boy image. Ladies love bad boys.”

“How do you know what ladies love?” Remus chuckled at James remark. At least the heavy spirits were lifted for now. But he still prepared himself for a lot of staring for at least the next year.

-

The sorting was pretty eventless as usual, Sirius fell into his usual way of ignoring his brother pretty easily since he hadn’t really talked to him over the summer break as well, but the one thing he had to actually bring himself to not stare at was Remus's face.

He had had only one good look at the four or five angry red scratches, but they didn’t look as if they would ever fade away. They had been tried to heal with magic, of course, else they wouldn’t be in that healing state right now, but magic could only do so much, especially with wounds from magical creatures. There was something Remus hadn’t told him about the scars, the same way Sirius always tried to avoid the topic of his home and the feeling of wanting to find out seemed to burn under his skin.

“Do you think Lily likes Quidditch?” James asked suddenly, and Sirius realized he had been torturing his mashed potatoes with his fork for at least the last ten minutes. His startled reaction earned him concerned looks from the other three boys, and he tried to overact this with a lazy grin and making fun of James.

“Hey, Evans,” he all but shouted to his left, where the redhead said next to some friends probably. “Do you like Quidditch?” This earned him giggling from al the girls surrounding the addressed and a big eye roll and a cold shoulder from Lily.

“Well, we’ll never know.” Sirius turned back towards a horrified looking James and a chuckling Remus and Peter.

“I will try for the team anyway,” James muttered to that and sunk back into his seat. He was normally a very outgoing guy with no sense of shame, except for when it was about Lily.

Sirius could see Peter's eyes widen before he could follow his sight towards his furry friend, a nickname that hadn’t quite adapted yet the way they wanted.

“You’re bleeding,” Sirius answered Remus unspoken question and handed over his clean napkin, which the other pressed at his chin where it was soon getting a big red spot.

“Thanks.” Sirius watched the other sink into his seat but smile and wondered how much time it would take for him to come back to his normal, sarcastic self.

“All right, how exactly do we plan to make the food of tomorrows breakfast scream when touched?”

-

The night was uneventful, even if it seemed to take ages for all of them to fall asleep and the sausages, they had prepared the previous late evening in the kitchen, did seem to lose the power of their voice after the third poke, but Remus slowly started to feel like himself again. Some angry looks of teachers were cast towards them as they left for their classes but everything, they could talk about was Quidditch anyways.

Or rather, James talked and then suddenly got very nervous when it became afternoon, and they had to get to the field soon.

“You’re awesome at Quidditch, James, you will manage,” Peter brabbled and tried to keep up with the others with his shorter legs.

“He knows that.” Sirius had his ever-growing hair tied into a small bun, and Remus had to admit, that it definitely did a favour for the bad boy look he seemed to be trying to establish. On the other hand, it already annoyed him to find longer black hair in the shower every year.

Of course, James managed. He had been sitting on a broom since before he could walk and also had some natural talent at throwing things at people and not missing a single time.

Remus held his hands over his ears and tried to remember a deafening charm, _anything,_ that night, when James and Sirius didn’t seem to stop singing things like: ‘James is our new chaser’ and ‘Gryffindor for the win’ and also the occasionally ‘James likes to throw balls’ and all this stuff.

It was no wonder then that he didn’t notice somebody entering his curtain clad bed later that night until they were already cuddled under the sheets. It was Sirius, of course, and he was shivering as if having spent the last two hours on a frozen lake.

Sirius was a non-secret cuddler, Remus thought as he wordlessly folded his limps around the other’s slightly smaller form, craving non-harmful touch from everybody who was or wasn’t willing to give it to him. Remus, on the other hand, was a secret cuddler, keeping touches initiated by himself at a minimum out of this weird, irrational fear of hurting someone even by a slightly too tight hug, but enjoying it immensely when it was coming from somebody else.

Remus knew, that just like him Sirius had a lot of bad dreams, but instead of the unnaturally shining eyes of Fenrir Greyback, they were probably starred by his mother and/or various other members of his family.

“Shh, it’s okay,” Remus said without knowing what else could help. He rubbed circles in the other’s back and noticed how he slowly seemed to unclench.

“What was it about?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Sirius whispered into his friends’ collar. “Tell me what happened when you got those scars.”

It was so much like Sirius to go from his problem to other’s and all but directly demanding for everybody to play along. All right, Remus thought, he wouldn’t shut up until he knew and in the darkness of their dormitory, the night three weeks ago suddenly seemed a lot closer than all day long. He cast a silencing charm to not wake the others.

“Well, you know, at my parent's house we have this… cellar where I go to transform since, well since back when I got bitten.” He didn’t like to talk or even think about that warm summers evening when he had been playing in the backyard, and his innocent childhood had found a sudden end.

“So, I went down there last full moon, and my dad was somewhere for his new job; well, he couldn’t just tell them, he needed to go home because his son was a werewolf or something. So, I was alone with my mom, and she wanted to make sure I was okay, so she followed me down, and I told her to go back up, cause, you know, moon was near, but she didn’t.” Remus sighed. He still remembered the moment her eyes had turned fearful when his had turned a glowing green.

“At some point, I let the wolf _demand_ of her to go out and she just-“ Searching for words was not easy, even though the darkness helped. “She _ran_ out and up the stairs where she must have tripped ‘cause as soon as the moon rose, and the wolf awakened, he smelled the blood and got crazy about it. I don’t remember much, just awakening the next morning with a lot of pain in my face.”

Remus shrugged to try to play it cool, but he sensed that his friend wasn’t buying it.

“Okay,” Sirius said after a while and toyed with the blanket covering them both.

Some people would have thought of it as weird, their nocturnal gatherings, but Remus considered them as one of the best hours of his nights.

Sirius stayed until the early morning, and he didn't say anything about how everything was okay, and everything would be okay in the future because it wouldn't, but at least they were here together and not in a cellar or the Black's family dining room.

-

“You look tired.” It was their first Hogsmeade visit and all third years ran excitedly from one shop to another. Except for Remus, who had let his friends dash off to Zonko’s and decided that leaning against a nearby wall was a completely fine thing to do. He had thought, that if he didn’t move for about ten minutes, he would completely blend in, but he hadn’t counted in a certain redhead.

“That could be because I am tired,” Remus remarked and kept his eyes closed, enjoying the exceptionally warm autumn sun. He didn’t really mean to use his sarcasm with people other than James, Peter and Sirius, but it was the day before the full moon, and if Remus had to hear the bell of any shop ring for another time, he would probably strangle someone.

“You know, you could have just stayed at the castle,” Lily said and leaned back next to him. Remus chuckled and looked at her through one half-lit eye.

“Who would keep an eye on them then?” 

“Your eyes were closed until now.” 

“I can hear them loud enough.”

He actually hadn’t wanted to say the last part, since a normal human shouldn’t be able to hear three boys debating about how many Dungbombs they needed from a store about a hundred feet away, but Lily just ignored it and turned her face into the sun as well.

“You know, I read about a potion,” she started after some time quietly, thoughtfully looking up into the sky, “that helps ease the pain when limps grow very fast.”

Remus's eyes were suddenly wide, and he searched Lily’s face for any hint of _anything_ , but she just looked at him in her earnest way and with an immense amount of knowledge in her green orbits.

“You know.” Not a question, just a fact.

“Yeah, figured out some time ago. And I also know for a fact that you aren’t exactly top of the class in potions, so I wanted to offer my help.”

Suddenly Remus found himself unable not to smile.

“I would really appreciate that,” he said, and she grinned back at him in a secret-sharing way.

“I have to get back, your friends are coming,” she chuckled as she looked over her shoulder and shook her head. “I really can’t see what you see in them, but I suppose they know?” Remus just nodded shortly and lifted a hand for a silent goodbye as she turned around and passed a stunned looking James as well as a frowning Sirius and a slightly smiling Peter.

“We wanted to go to Honeydukes and then head home,” Sirius said and shook his head over James, who still looked after Lily’s vanishing form. “Shall we just get you some chocolate or do you wanna come?” There was a deep worry line between his eyes and Remus didn’t like that.

“I heard they have Bubble Gum that doesn’t pop for days if you blow a bubble and Bonbons that explode in your mouth,” Peter said with a glint in his eyes, even if a little afraid of the latter and the others seemed similarly excited.

“All right I’ll come,” Remus sighed and followed two hopping and one shuffling boy over to the store.

It was very crowded in and around Honeydukes, but when he stood in front of a shelf filled with hundreds and hundreds of different bars of chocolate, Remus thought it was definitely worth it. He sometimes got a package from home with books and chocolate, but never saw anything quite like this. What in Merlin name was ‘Unicorn Chocolate’ and who would mix Every Flavour Beans with Remus favourite food.

“Remus, James and Sirius said I should come, fetch you,” a very panting Peter appeared behind the addressed with these words.

“Tell them, I’m not finished deciding jet,” Remus retorted still in thoughts without turning around. He had three different chocolates in his hands and didn’t know if he’d rather like ‘Sprinkled cupcake Chocolate’, ‘Cotton Candy Chocolate’ or ‘Chocolate with Blood Orange flavour’.

“Then just buy all of them,” the very impatient sounding voice of Sirius Black piped up from his left.

“But I can only afford one,” Remus snapped back, closing his eyes because what in Merlin’s name, he knew it was the day before the full moon but that was no excuse, even if all the people in this room where making so much noise, that it felt as if his head would explode soon.

“I’m sor-“ He didn’t even get to finish when Sirius snapped the bars from his hands as soon as he opened his eyes and stalked off with them.

“You didn’t have to-“ Remus tried to interfere again as his friend thrust the chocolate back at him after paying.

“Don’t. It’s my parent’s. And I would love to see their faces if they knew I bought something for my ‘filthy’ friends with it. Now, James isn’t getting any younger over there, so let’s see what he found out.”

The moment the three reached their mutual friend, Remus got a sense of what was going on. James stood next to a door that probably led to some kind of storage room or cellar, and his whole posture screamed mischief. He could just as well shout through the shop that he planned something illegal, and it would have the same effect.

“So, I had a short look inside of the cellar, when Mr Flume put away some packages; they are definitely there,” James greeted them and judging from Peter’s look, he also had no clue what was going on.

“What are ‘they’,” Remus asked politely, slowly feeling the excitement swap over to him from the two grinning boys.

“You probably don’t remember, but I told you about some new sweets they invented at a company of one of my dad’s friends. There have been rumours, that they have one kind, Glowing-in-the-Dark candy sticks stored in the Honeydukes cellar since they want to sell them as soon as all paperwork has been done, and I just saw them!”

It was clear that Peter’s eyes widened at the prospect of new sweets, and Remus had to admit the appeal as well, but he was almost sure of what was about to come next.

Something exploded at the other end of the store as if on command and everybody turned their heads. “Let’s go,” Sirius grinned, and after having looked around very suspiciously, James opened the door, and the four of them stumbled through.

The light was a little dim in the room they reached after climbing down a narrow set of stairs. Almost on reflex, Remus got out his want and whispered “Lumos”, which was followed by four boys grinning at each other in the cold white light of the spell.

“Ah, here they are”, James exclaimed a little too loud, and Remus wondered for a second if he should cast a silencing spell over them, but how would he do that with his want high in the air and a second later he was distracted anyway by a completely different light.

Because James eyes suddenly shone bright orange as if they were the headlights of an old car.

“That’s awesome”, Peter forgot to whisper again, bit into a bright blue stick, chewed a little and suddenly not only his eyes glowed blue but also his slightly hanging open mouth.

He seemed to be surprised so much by that, that he took a step back and all four boys froze as a glass shattered on the ground.

“What was that?” and “No look that way, James,” were probably heard from the next street.

Soon Remus found himself crawling on the ground with his friends trying to catch some kind of Bonbons that seemed to jump a few inches in the air as soon as they touched a surface. Suddenly Sirius slapped his hands together right in front of his face and revealed a Bonbon that he immediately stuffed into his mouth while grinning madly.

Remus just couldn’t hold the chuckle that was building up inside his chest. Every time his friends got him in these unimaginable, illegal and sometimes life-threatening situations and every time it felt like the best time of his life.

He spotted a Bonbon on the ground, which apparently tried to roll away from him and then vanished into a crack in the floor.

It actually turned out to be more than a crack after further inspection, and when Remus slipped his whole hand into the split in the concrete, he could feel it was going around the corner, exactly where his Bonbon had gone off to. Realizing the position of his hand, as if gripping a handle and the other cracks in the floor, he just pulled and suddenly stood there with a big piece of the floor in his hands.

“I didn’t… break it off,” he half-heartedly joked towards his friends who had turned around and were now as well staring at the gaping hole in the floor.

“Where do you think this heads to?” Peter asked, not without a hint of nervousness in his voice.

“Let’s find out.” The other three boys were sure, and since Remus couldn’t hear any harm in at least the next five hundred meters and there would be a lot to explain if someone found them right now, they all jumped in.


	5. The third Year (Part II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Secret passageways are to be discovered and revolutionary ideas are forming in the young boys heads. Oh, and then there is to teach a young Sirius a proper Christmas.

“Okay so let’s conclude this day,” James mumbled around a bunch of different sweets. “We found a secret passage going from Hogwarts to the cellar of Honedukes.”

“But we don’t know how to get in from here since that one-eyed which just closed it again and even our furry friend couldn't open it.” Sirius was sitting on Remus bed, watching him put together his stuff for the next day in the hospital wing. Nobody mentioned that five bars of chocolate found their way in his bag.

“Maybe we’ll find something in some spellbook,” the werewolf said absentmindedly and looked out of the window at the setting sun. “Go search for it in the library tomorrow.”

Even Sirius nodded at that, normally being the one to avoid this place at any cost, even if they all knew, that he would be even with James if it wasn’t for a certain red-headed girl.

“You’ll be okay?” James asked, and Remus sighed. He had to be, didn’t he?

“Sure. Just don’t let Sirius get to me until after lunch. He has a way of keeping me awake, like a little puppy, begging for attention.”

Remus turned his back to the pouting expression of his one friend and the worried ones of the others and headed towards another full moon.

-

“What if we make a map.”

It was right before the first Quidditch game this year - Gryffindor against Ravenclaw – and the four boys were munching their breakfast in the great hall. Two of them turned their questioning glances to Sirius, one fidgeted with his fork, deeply in thoughts. Probably because he had to play in his first game in less than an hour.

“What kind of map?” Remus asked politely, and only his friends were able to distinguish the hint of sarcasm in his words. They hadn’t made a lot of progress in finding the spell for the one-eyed witch.

They actually had found some spells, but due to an unfortunate event during potions, involving some flying rat tails and a certain Severus Snape, completely covered in green goe, they hadn’t been able to test them since all of them had gotten daily detention.

Sirius had tried to insist, that if they had taken more rat tails, they could have hit more Slytherin and that they should try it again, but the others mischief had seemed to have reached a low. Maybe some kind of big project could help there.

“You know, I saw this kind of parchment the other day, that only revealed its content if given a password.” It had been in the restricted section in the middle of the night, to find the witch thing and he hadn’t known the password, to which the parchment had reacted with an ink attack, but at least now even James stared in his direction.

“So, I was thinking, what if we made a map of Hogwarts” and he lowered his voice at that part, “and include all the secret passages we know of. The witch, the shack, the one behind the statue of Gregory the Smarmy.” They really needed secret names for these.

“You mean, we bewitch the map, so only we can read it?” Remus asked slowly because the others still looked confused. “But we know where they are, or do you forget them as frequent as your homework? Do you need to see a doctor, Sirius?”

“I think it’s a good idea,” Peter piped up, and Sirius almost rolled his eyes. Of course, you do, it’s not dangerous or especially illegal. Yet.

“Ah, my dear Remus, you didn’t let me finish. The awesome thing about this map will be that we can see everybody in the castle right where they are, right at that moment.”

What followed was a thick silence in which everyone just stared at Sirius, making him a little uncomfortable, but he wouldn’t back down.

“That’s impossible,” Remus uttered in the same moment, James exclaimed a little too loudly for a secret discussion: “That’s awesome!”

“It will already be hard enough to make a map of all of Hogwarts, how do you want to involve moving people in it?” Remus shook his head, and Sirius raised his eyebrows. “Well, I have to say there are some tracking spells we could try…”

“Nooo, more books,” James muttered from where he had let his head sink into his peas, but the others grinned. They knew he was just nervous and would never miss the opportunity to put effort in ‘prank work’ how they secretly called it. At least Sirius and James did.

“But wouldn't it be awesome,” Sirius pressed on and let them wait for the rest of the sentence in a truly dramatic manner “if we knew where everybody was, at every time of the day. We would never be caught again, we would be indestructible.”

“Unreachable” James continued having sat up straight again.

“Unbeatable.” Remus.

“Like Kings.” Peter.

“Like Gods” Sirius continued, letting the rush of having convinced his friends flow through him, the rush of having a common goal, a project. “We will reign over Hogwarts like no one has ever done before and we will go down as legends in all the history books.”

-

Of course, you couldn't be a legend if you didn't work hard for it and so the four Gryffindor boys spend almost all of their free time from then on almost until the Christmas break in the library.

“How can it be possible, that none of these tracking spells works for more than five minutes” James exclaimed from his position on top of one of the desks of the library, what the librarian, Madam Pince had already frowned upon multiple times. Remus had already had the suspicion, that the very strict witch had never liked the two most troublesome boys of their group and was not happy that they spend every afternoon if not for detention in her holy halls.

“It's probably because you cast them,” Sirius answered absent-mindedly, eyes focussed at the lines before him.

The werewolf wondered not for the first time if the two of them knew that they sounded like a bickering, married couple most of the time and tried to focus on the book in front of him again. He had found something, two weeks ago in the restricted section on a night shift he had done with Peter because he wasn't noisy, but he didn't want to tell the others yet. He wanted to have it right.

“So, what kind of traditions do your parents have for Christmas” was what shook Remus out of his reading. The conversation had apparently not stopped at Sirius remark and was, as well as the young werewolf could judge, heading in a dangerous direction. “I mean, do they have a black Christmas tree, do they torture muggles and make them play Santa's elves or something? You know, stuff like that.”

Peter had snickered, probably at imagining the black tree with black ornaments and black candles, but Sirius expression changed from mildly amused to ice cold. I wouldn't want this look directed at me, Remus thought for a brief second, but then realized it wasn't the whole truth. He never wanted Sirius to have to direct that look at anyone ever again. Especially not because of his family.

“I'm not going home for Christmas,” the werewolf piped in to save his friend and three pair of eyes immediately swept over to him. “The full moon is even closer to Christmas than last year, and it wouldn't make sense to go home for just a few days. In addition to this, I can even continue searching for a way to track a certain red-haired girl, maybe, so I can follow her around even more efficiently.“

The picture in front of Remus was grotesque, and he had definitely archived what he had aimed for. James' mouth was wide agape, and even though Sirius had knit his brows together, there was humour in his eyes. To everybody's surprise, Peter was the first to find his words.

“I'm also not going home,” he explained fiddling with his tie which was, just like Sirius' and James' as usual weirdly knotted or not knotted at all. Right now, the young Black actually wore his as a kind of hair tie around his messy, black hair.

“You're also turning into a howling, fur-clad creature?” Sirius asked, even though there wasn't any bite behind his words. Almost as if he didn't want to direct the attention back at himself, Remus thought regarding him more closely.

“I bet there isn't fur everywhere,” James threw in, followed by an uncertain “is there?” in Remus direction. The addressed boy just shrugged, since they never put a mirror into the Shrieking Shack for reasons known, and earned a curious look from Sirius.

“Why aren't you going home for Christmas?” Remus asked because he hated it when people even James and Sirius, just talked over their friend like this and maybe a little bit because he had been thinking of last years Christmas break, wanting to relive it. Of course, he also liked the company of his other friends over being alone, but this one week, only with Sirius and him in their dormitory had had something magical about it.

“My dad has won a cruise ship travel for two through some magazine. They are going to the Bahamas over Christmas.”

For a minute or so, Remus dwelled on how ignorant and encapsulated wizards sometimes were and how dumbstruck his two remaining friends now stared at Peter.

“What about you two?” the werewolf asked, even though he already knew one of the answers. “Why don't we all stay here and research a little bit more. It could be nice.”

“Maybe we should,” James replied slowly, comically tapping a finger to his chin and then readjusting his glasses. “Also, we can't leave only Peter in charge of comforting the big bad wolf on the days of his recovery. He would eat all of his chocolate!”

Even if this was another hit against Peter, who by the looks of it didn't realize that, Remus put on a smile and expectantly looked over the boy who knew his deepest secrets and biggest fears.

“I will have to check with my parents first,” the usually overly extravagant boy mumbled while looking down towards his book. When he looked up though, Remus gaze was met with one of sheer thankfulness, and maybe this Christmas wouldn't be too bad.

“Then it's settled!” James exclaimed, earning himself an angry stare from Madame Pince. “A mischievous Christmas it is,” he added in a whisper.

“For the hundredth time, we're not naming our group 'the mischievous boy', James.” And the banter was back.

At least this way Christmas wouldn't be lonely for any of them. And Remus was already forming a plan in his head as to what presents to get for his friends. A mischievous Christmas it would be.

-

Sirius was the last to get up at Christmas morning. The four of them had slept in the previous days, and he had thought they would do the same thing today, so he had stayed awake late the previous evening.

James and Peter leaving the room was what had woken him, and as he checked on Remus, he had noticed, that his amber-eyed friend had already made his bed.

The only thing he remembered about Christmas at home was that his parents had always talked about how pathetic these muggles were, believing in some kind of god and spoiling their kids with presents to please him. Sirius remembered mentioning his parents' ideas of Christmas to his friends in second year and them laughing as if he made a joke.

So he got up because apparently that was what you did on a Christmas morning at nine a.m. and noticed a cup from the kitchen and a note on his trunks.

_Leave your pyjamas on and come down as soon, as you read this._

_Remus_

Sirius turned the letter over and over in his hands because what did the others have planned? Did they want to prank him? Why would they tell him to leave his pyjamas on?

The cup at least contained some mildly warm hot chocolate, and Sirius took a few cautious gulps after having heated it with magic. Remus wouldn't joke with chocolate, that was for sure.

After a short and heated discussion with himself, Sirius decided to leave the pyjamas on. Whatever happened, it couldn't be as bad as his families 'traditions'.

He saw them the moment he stepped on the bridge between the girls and boys dormitories.

There had only been a few other students in higher years, who stayed at Hogwarts over the break, but apparently, they weren't here right now.

Because the only moving things in the Gryffindor common room this years Christmas morning where Remus, Peter and James. And thousands of thousands of colourful lights, floating all over the room, apparently directed by the latter.

Peter was the first one to notice Sirius, and as he alerted the others and a few of the lights fell down, the young Black felt a bubbling sensation rise in his body, as if he wanted to grin or cry, or to laugh. He settled for all three of them when all of his friends met his gaze and the floating lights spelt “Merry Chritsmas, Sirios!” in the air.

He wanted to thank them, that they were the family he never had, but choose only to do so by hugging them. Especially Remus, hard, because he knew how he would flinch but secretly love it.

“Now to the important matter of hand,” Remus interrupted the other three casting nasty words across the Gryffindor common rooms ceiling. Sirius noticed just now that all three of his friend were also still in pyjamas. Even Remus.

“What's that?” Sirius asked, and yes, he might have sounded like in overly eager puppy, but that didn't mean James and Peter were allowed to snicker.

“The presents, of course!” James exclaimed this with a wide, open-armed gesture, seemingly completely unaffected by Sirius playfully angry gaze.

Sirius noticed how his brows were knitting together because he hadn't known presents were required, and he hadn't gotten anything and did the others actually have presents for him?

“I know, it's your first real Christmas with a green tree instead of a black one,” James started, but Remus cut him off.

“So we got presents for you for training, but next year you will have to get some for us as well.”

Sirius knew his mouth was agape as they walked over to the big Christmas tree in the middle of the common room, but he didn’t care. There, under the evergreen leaves lay several piles of presents, nicely wrapped, some small and some big, some shiny and some with little prints on them.

“That one’s yours,” James said as he lowered himself down to the floor next to another pile. Sirius couldn’t believe his eyes. Of course, he was used to being able to buy everything, ever, but being given something because somebody cared about you was a completely different story.

“You need to unwrap them,” Peter suggested his mouth already filled with sweets he got out of a big green box.

The first one his fingers touched was longish and shiny red and wrapped so badly it could only be from James. The teenage boy pried the wrapping paper away slowly as if he had never received a gift before, even though he had, but mostly school supplies he needed anyways and self-made stuff from Regulus when he was little.

He wondered for a moment what his little brother was doing right now, he probably was allowed to go home and made to attend a few balls and social events while Sirius was ‘sick’, but stopped in his thoughts when he revealed a feather.

But not just any feather, it sparkled, and when he turned around it exclaimed loudly: “I have been a bad, bad bird!” and he turned it around again, and it screamed: “Write harder!”

He heard James laugh and Remus snort and decided that this was the best Christmas ever in the history of Christmases.

He answered the “I bewitched it myself, do you like it?” from James with a “Yeah, thanks, it’s awesome!” and a “Write harder!” and went on to the next present.

Peter had gotten him some Dungbombs and Glowsticks, which fitting for Christmas had reached the shop area just a week prior. Peter grinned at him over the flying saucer James had made for him, where you could put stuff on, you didn’t want to carry right now and which followed you everywhere.

Even the Potters had sent him a package, which contained self-made socks, probably by Mrs Potter.

When he reached the last package, Sirius felt even more excitement rise in his veins, because the neatly with snowflake paper-wrapped package was undoubtedly from Remus and for some reason that made the young Black warm all over. It didn’t even matter what was in it.

For some reason, he seemed to have picked up the package at a similar time as James his and their eyes met with raised brows because they looked not only kind of similar but almost identically.

James tore away the paper, so Sirius did the same, just to reveal a rolled piece of parchment. An empty piece of parchment. He turned over and over again and then first looked at a similar confused looking James and then over to Remus.

Who just grinned.

“Maybe you should say ‘Blandingus', or something,” he said and was met with three very irritated looks.

James was the first to mutter ‘Blandingus’ his wand pointed towards his piece of parchment and Sirius did the same.

_Dear Sirius,_ appeared on the blank page and the addressed blinked.

_I’m happy this worked since until a week ago the parchment normally caught fire at this point._

_You were right. Together we can do anything, even overcome the madness that infiltrates the every life of boring people. This is not only helpful to hide the map we are planning, but I thought when we are apart, we can write our letters like this._

_Don’t forget to say ‘Blabedidup’ after you read this._

_Yours,_

_Remus_

“Dude, that’s so awesome,” James exclaimed, having blanked his page already and turning it around again.

Sirius grinned at his friends as if the sides of his mouth were glued to his ears.

“Jamie boy is right.” He nodded and knew he got this mischievous glint in his eyes because he could see it in the others’ as well. “But we really need better passwords.”


	6. The fourth Year (Part I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The fourth year of their Hogwarts career brings some revelation with it, that comes to Sirius in the most useless moment possible. Also the boys still rather search the school for new adventures than do their homework, but that's nothing new.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I always have this feeling, that Sirius Black must have been one of the most dramatic persons ever throughout his life, what means, that also only the most dramatic things can happen to him. I hope you enjoy^.^

It was not that summer break that he noticed.

It was not the moment they said their goodbyes and he trailed along after Kreacher, shoulders sagged, expression as if he was walking to the gallows that he knew.

It was almost half a year into the school year, and it completely swept him off his broom. Literally.

-

This year's summers break was a quiet affair. There were no weddings, no family gatherings the oldest Black's son was invited to and no locking him into his room because he didn't behave.

Instead, there was a lot of silence.

His parents didn't talk to him, his brother didn't look him in the eyes, and Kreacher only told him how disgusting he and his friends were.

So Sirius decided to spend his time else way.

_ Dear Remus, _

_ Since your latest letter made me envy the meeting of you and James at the Potter mansion, I decided to live some adventures of my own. After having tried and failed to climb out of the window multiple times, I just went out the front door. And who would have guessed: nobody noticed me. _

_ I have made a few new friends. (Of course, they will never replace you, but if I ever needed to hide I could easily ask Stefán (or however he writes his name)) _

_ So there is Stafán, who not only owns a music shop for muggles (Muggle music is so weird, did you know that?) and tattoos people in the back. I’m thinking to get the Gryffindor lion just to annoy my folks, what do you think? _

_ I hope the wolf is tamable and I’m delighted that we can finally stop writing in code. That was really annoying, and I think half of the time, I didn’t understand what you all wanted to say. Especially James. _

_ I will, of course, write another letter to him, but if you would please hide some green slime in his shoes, or something for me, that would be marvellous. _

_ I also met a group of people, friends of Stefán, who have colourful hair, metal in their noses and eyebrows, a lot of holes in their clothes and drink alcohol as well as smoke varying substances. They have fascinating views on the world, and even though they don’t believe in magic, Anna, a girl of the group, told me that she had seen a UFO last year. The world is mysterious. _

_ I suspect that if I leave the house for too long, my mother will just change the password so I won’t get in again, but so far it hasn’t happened. Will keep you updated on that. _

_ Devoted to you in eternity _

_ Yours _

_ Sirius _

Sirius put away his blinking and shouting quill and appreciated his letter. He would give an arm to be with his friends right now, but at least he didn’t have a beak.

-

It was also not the moment he saw them again, even though in a retrospective it should have been.

Remus had gotten handsome. In a completely platonic, appreciable way, as if one looked at an aesthetically pleasing painting. At least that was what Sirius told himself, as the fourteen-year-old werewolf approached him.

He had cut his hair, was one of the very objective observations the young Black made that moment. It even seemed as if his face had seen the sun for a change and the smile on his face said something in the lines of: ‘what do I care if you see the scratches in my face’ or ‘you should see the other person’.

“What are you staring at?” a voice asked from Sirius’ right and he swirled around as if being caught doing something forbidden.

“Remus is on time” Sirius answered quickly to play down his reaction. He then proceeded to look James up and down, from the crooked and already broken new glasses on his face over the raven hair pointing in every direction possible and impossible and finally to his dress pants, ending three centimetres too high.

“How is it possible that the both of you grew so much in the last weeks?” Sirius looked from James to Remus who had just joined them and then to Peter behind him.

The latter just shrugged being short of breath, and the young black felt as if a heavy weight felt from his shoulders while a to others probably arrogant looking smile split his face.

They entered the train and waved at the Potters, Lupins and Peter’s mom.

“I have the feeling that more students are going to Hogwarts every year.” James was walking ahead of the group, making their way through the wagons.

There seemed to be a disturbance, since he suddenly stopped and Sirius got into his toes to see, grabbing the closest object next to him for stability. Which happened to be Remus’ shoulder.

A shouted “Severus” shook him out of his touch induced trance. By Merlin, what was wrong with him.

The scene in front of them was even weirder than Sirius confusing feelings about touches that had once been just nice and Not hypnotizing. As far as the young Black could make out, there was a group of fourth-year Slytherins, among them Snivellius, who seemed to urge some younger

students out of a compartment. This seemed to have stopped all other students trying to pass through the train, but a head with flaming red hair was still clearly visible.

At the sight of Lily Evans Sirius felt a familiar wave of respect paired with a bitter taste rising in his throat.

“Oi Snivellius” James shouted probably without having thought for a second. But that was what Sirius loved about him, and he would be in for whatever happened. “Are you taking the fact that your mother doesn’t love you out on smaller children again.”

“Maybe he thinks they’re at eye-level” Sirius immediately piped in feeling all the resentment the Slytherin house had brought upon him wash over him at once. “I mean duelling skill-wise, for example.”

He now noticed that among the older Slytherin’s group were also Mulciber and Avery and even the young Black knew they weren’t good news. He didn’t care, though.

Severus Snape’s gaze met theirs, and his eyes became small slits, while he apparently searched for a way to retort.

Sirius did his best to put on his most convincing ‘bring it on’ face and crossed his arms in front of his chest.

There were more students now, behind them, in front of them, some waiting impatiently, some just outright staring.

“Severus, come on,” Lily said again, and the four young Gryffindors could see the exact moment the black-haired boy made up his mind by the look in his eyes. Instead of making a big scene, he just submerged into the crowd and Lily after him. This seemed to end the situation since the older Slytherins locked themselves in “their” compartment, and the rest of the students continued their way.

“What does she see in him?” a completely dumbfounded looking James asked as he turned around towards his friends. 

“Maybe, she’s actually into Death Eaters.” Sirius said it but immediately knew he didn’t mean it. “You’ll probably need to become evil now,” he added for the others to know he was joking since he kept a straight face through it all.

“Apropos, knowing your family, have you heard what You-know-who is up to recently?” James asked Sirius as they started walking again, and only Peter piping up stopped him from being strangled. The other pureblood seemed to love to forget, that being a Black, didn’t mean his mother was having tea with Voldemort and his friends on Sundays.

“I heard he has been seen attacking a Muggle-village in north England with a group of giants,” Peter piped up with his currently creaking voice, changing between a few octaves while doing so. “I mean, what is next, werew-” He stopped there having realized his mistake. “W- what I wanted to say was, he seems to gather people around himself who have been cast out by wizarding society, at least that’s what my mom said...”

He looked up at Remus as if he was afraid the other boy would pretty up his face like he did with his own, but the werewolf only grinned at him.

“Maybe I have a better chance with Lily after all”, was what made James launch at him, starting a play fight in the middle of the train and made sure everyone knew they were back. Why couldn’t this last forever? Sirius asked himself. Why did they need to get back home every summer?

If he thought of it like that it wasn’t true. He didn’t go home every summer. He always went home on the first of September.

-

The Quidditch season started late this year and this way the boys had a lot of time to research tracking spells and design the map. They also spend some newfound energy on more innovative pranks, mostly to the discomfort of the majority of teachers and students.

They snuck out almost every night, except for one per month, to find new passageways and to try out new spells with the one-eyed witch.

The night they tried Dissendium, a spell, they had just learned in Defence Against the Dark Arts, but only because Sirius had “accidentally” poured ink over his own book and had to use the teacher’s more advanced one instead, they had not actually planned to stop by her. The spell was described to unbolt doors, but nobody used it any more, and it had become forgotten.

Remus was the one to cast it, and as a barely human-sized hole opened in the hump, revealing only darkness, James had almost screeched in delight, and they had to hide immediately.

“I need your help” a ruffled looking Sirius stated suddenly standing right in front of him, shaking Remus out of his memory of that night. It was shortly after dinner, they were in the Gryffindor common room, and Remus had sat down at one of the couches with a cup of tea and the overly realistic plan to finish his Transfiguration homework.

They were overly realistic because he was sick. Again. It was still about a week until the next full moon, but the young werewolf wondered, how the wolf would react to being sick. Probably not that well, but Remus had the suspicion anyway, that the creature in himself, somehow had the power to heal himself, at least from small injuries. Still, he couldn’t access it every other day of the month.

Even though he tried to control it, Remus sneezed the second he wanted to answer and his friend took a step back, a sympatric look on his face but also looking as if he didn’t want to trade places if he could avoid it. The young werewolf wondered for a second if Sirius had ever been ill in his life and came to the conclusion that he probably hadn't, as the other made his way to sit down on the couch next to Remus’ feet. He seemed to consider his following actions for a second, then placed his friend's feet including blanket on his lap and reached for the parchment and quill he had placed on a table next to him.

“I happen to have to write an essay”, the young Black started, and knowing what was probably about to come, Remus rolled his eyes and began to retract his feet. But Sirius would have none of that and held onto his friend's legs as if his life depended on it.

“Please, Remus, most awesome fourth year Gryffindor boy besides me? Please, it is about your favourite magical creature.” At that, Remus lifted his brows, an amused smile playing around his chapped lips, as he yet again couldn’t pass his friends bedding up.

“I mean, they are definitely  _ my _ favourite magical creatures, I don’t know about you, but Professor Fernsby made us choose at the end of the last class and since I hadn’t listened before, I, of course, took,” he lowered his voice a little and Remus wished he didn’t have to, “werewolves.”

“When is the essay due?” the brown-haired boy asked even if he was sure he already knew the answer.

“Tomorrow.” Sirus grinned as if he didn’t have a sorrow in the world. 

Remus noticed that his friend's hair was even longer than last year, almost touching his shoulders now that he didn’t wear it in a bun for once. This and the safety pins on the collar of his white dress shirt belonging to the Gryffindor uniform were probably influenced, and the young werewolf wasn’t sure if he liked that or not. What if Sirius found them more interesting than his wizard friends one day and left the murderous creature he befriended behind?

Remus shook his head to clear it of those thoughts. It didn’t matter how scared he was that his friends one day saw what he really was and left him behind since he right now could enjoy every moment there was still had with them.

“What do you want to know?” he asked instead, sipping from his tea. Sometimes he wondered if he was a dear old lady, deep down inside. But no, there was no space left.

“So, first of all, what is exactly necessary to transform someone, I mean you got bitten, didn’t you? By a werewolf?” Remus nodded, absent-mindedly placing a warm hand on the massive scar on his side. Of course, his father had tried to hide it, but as with all wounds from magical creatures, it was no use.

Sirius, in the meantime, had gotten big eyes and was staring at his hand at his side.

“Can I see it?” he asked in a mixture of reverence and anticipation and Remus honestly wondered if there was something wrong with his friend. 

“Maybe some other time.” That didn’t seem to satisfy the young, black-haired boy, which was why the young werewolf tried to distract him. “The saliva of a wolf at a full moon has to mix with your blood for you to transform into a werewolf.”

Sirius' eyes went wide again, and Remus wondered if his friend had even opened a book before asking for his help. By the looks of it, the answer was probably no.

“All right, all right”, Sirius mumbled while taking some notes. “Now, what can you tell me about the transformation, I mean, how fast is it, how much do you consciously notice, yadda yadda.”

Remus rolled his eyes at his friend, but not because he was annoyed. He wanted to gain some time, in which he tried to think about a way to make it sound more harmless than it was, but not to lie.

“It… hurts,” he said and looked at Sirius who had halted in his scribbling and then down at his frayed blanket. “From the first limps growing to the full wolf, I would say it takes about ten minutes, but it depends. The legs and the back are the worst since they have to grow the most. The eyes also change, and it feels as if someone is pressing your eyeballs into your head.”

He stopped, seeing the shocked expression on Sirius’ face. “But it is much better now since Lily got me that potion and also I mostly don’t remember half of it.”

“How much do you remember?”

“Nothing. Nothing much. Just... just glimpses of darkness and howling and a feeling of being so angry to be caged in and wanting to be free.”

They were silent for a long moment, not an uncomfortable silence, just both of them bathing in their thoughts. Maybe they were both haunted, both doomed to live the life their circumstances wrote for them. Or maybe they could write their own story.

“Do you want to see the newest draft me and James drew of the first floor of the castle? I think we got it right this time.” Sirius smiled this wide, charming grin of his and maybe they were doomed and a little bit insane, but at least they had each other.

-

The day it happened was the day of the delayed Quidditch tryout, and it was really stupid, wasn’t it, because Sirius only sat on a broom that day because he had lost a bet. First of all, how should he have known, that hexing the dessert out of the great hall and to appear randomly in school corridors for a week would make students go to exceptional risks to get them? And how should he have known that especially the members of the Quidditch team would think of it as a good idea to try to reach an absolutely beautiful and gorgeous cake just above the doors of the great hall by flying up there at top speed not only bringing them to the hospital wing with severe concussions but also banning them from the use of brooms for at least a few months.

So this was the reason those delayed Quidditch team tryouts were held in the first place, but, of course, Sirius had to top this by betting that he would find them a respectable replacement for McInerney, because to be honest it kind of was his fault that he couldn’t play and if he didn’t find one to this day he had to try out himself.

He, Sirius Black, who was above playing Quidditch because those silly games were below him and maybe he was just bad at it, not worse than Remus but still not good.

That was the reason, why Sirius sat on a broom sixty feet above the quidditch field with a face as if he was meeting his Lord and saviour, Merlin.

James waved at him cheerily from his right, of course, the guy was a genius, at least in that sport and didn’t even need to put both hands on his broom.

Sirius scanned the crowd below and could make out Peter and some girls he knew from class, but not Remus, of course not Remus since it was the day after the full moon. The young Black hadn’t even had time to visit his friend this morning, had only seen him sleeping through a gap of the door to the hospital wing on his way to the field.

The shrill sound of Madam Hooches whistle split the air and effectively Sirius wandering thoughts, making him remember why he was here. Right. Quidditch.

They played for a while, Sirius actually hitting some bludgers but he noticed that he was not actually a hundred per cent in the game, some parts always thinking about if his favourite werewolf was okay. If he hurt himself too badly, what if he was in pain?

The girls screeching from below, Sirius not seldomly cast his gaze towards the crowd, and that was where, after a bludger just missed his bat by inches, he noticed a human form limping on the field.

It was Remus, it was him. He was well enough to come here, probably not, but he had somehow convinced Madam Pomfrey to let him go, and the sight of him made the heart of the boy on the broom beat a lot faster, as if it wanted to tell him something.

Something in the lines of: “We should never let this one go. He makes us feel like no one ever does”.

In addition to this, a strong feeling of needing to protect and wanting to be protected surged through Sirius as he stared down at the limping boy and he could swear that their gazes locked, even if it was hard to tell from up here and that’s when he knew.

He just knew.

Holy Merlin.

There were moments in most people’s life’s when it was as if they were watching themselves from an outside perspective and this was one of those for Sirius as he got pulled out of his thoughts by a collision with the stands.

As if in slow motion and way too fast at the same time, he felt first his broom, then his face touch the fabric clad wood aggressively whereupon he lost control over his flying stick and just fell. Well just falling didn’t describe it since he had perforated the blue-silver fabric at his first collision and had managed to hold onto it for the first few seconds which made it rip apart gravely.

The moment he hit the floor felt as if the world came to a sudden halt. He had been moving, and now he wasn’t anymore, everything was fine.

That was until the pain came, and the voices reached his ears a second later.

“Make way! Make way!” Madam Hooch seemed to shout all over Hogwarts grounds, effectively clearing the sky above Sirius which appeared to have been clouded by faces.

Suddenly there was a face he hadn’t expected, not so soon, which was shortly joined by two more. Of course, they were ignoring the authority persons Instructions just like he had taught them.

“Where does it hurt the most?” a wide-eyed but concentrated looking Remus asked him. Sirius noticed the werewolf’s hands hovering above his half on the side-lying body, want in hand as if he wanted to hex him.

“Head... breathing” Sirius managed to bite out. He decided to continue watching his friend, how the sun touched his cheekbones, and how his hair stood up in every direction.

“Somebody needs to notify Madam Pomfrey,” some voice from somewhere shouted, which Remus only answered with an “already did” or something, Sirius didn’t know for sure because the world started to become fuzzy around the edges.

“Stay with me.” Worried looking James and Peter's faces were replaced by Madam Hooches who then started to talk to Remus about ribs and blood, but the young Black didn’t really understand them anymore.

Then the sky above went black as well.


	7. The fourth Year (Part II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wouldn't life be hard if you were not only questioning your sexuality and in love with one of your best friends, but you were also a wizard? Well, Sirius was about to find out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delayed posting, still trying to figure out the fifth year ^.^

The next thing that Sirius noticed and it could have been hours or seconds after the fall was the warmth of a blanket on top of him. Whoever had put it on him, had really wrapped it around his form and he felt a suspicion raise in himself that it had been James since he secretly did so with Remus when the werewolf was sick.

Speaking of, Sirius suddenly remembered why he had crashed into the stand’s tower what seemed to make all of his blood rush to his face before he could prevent it.

“I think he is awake” the unsure voice of Peter Pettigrew sounded through the room and Sirius opened his eyes trying to will his blood to more useful places.

“Bloody Merlin, you scared us.” James sat on his bed, but his body had been turned to Sirius’ right.

“How do you feel?” Remus asked from there, and Sirius would have never admitted that the sudden movement of turning to him had his head spinning.

“Fine. I’m fine.” The boy in the bed next to him looked a lot worse than he felt, so it was probably partially true. But the pain was gone, so that was awesome.

“Remus”, Sirius started casting a glance towards the bandaged leg of his friend sticking out of the white blanket, which made the red stains on it even more prominent.

You can never tell him, was a sudden thought that manifested in Sirius’ brain. He is your friend, he has enough problems. What was even wrong with him? Who fell in love with one of his best friends?

Before he could panic more, James shook Sirius out of his thoughts, which he would be forever grateful for.

“So, you didn’t get the spot,” he began, and the young Black wasn’t the only one who chuckled. “But one of the sixths years who you blackmailed into trying out was pretty decent, and that’s why the Gryffindor Quidditch Team officially forgives you.”

Interrupting their laughter, the door to the hospital wing suddenly burst open. At the sight of Lily Evans, Sirius expected to feel the usual bitterness surge through him, but today it was overshadowed by realization.

The realization that James looked exactly like he felt when Lily approached Remus bed and talked to him about homework and stuff, ignoring the other three completely. She seemed to leave a book for the werewolf, and then they both laughed.

It was jealousy, Sirius realized, like James was jealous of Remus for having such an easy connection to Lily he was jealous of the redhead.

Because she was a girl and Remus seemed to like her.

“Are you done?” he suddenly asked, a little harsher than he had intended and all eyes in the room suddenly landed on him. “Moody’d rather rest, wouldn’t you?”

Maybe the last part made it even worse, but what did Sirius Black care. He didn’t need to be friendly to people outside of their group.

“Moony?” Lily asked as if a lightbulb had exploded in her brain and she looked to Remus as if his friend hadn’t just basically thrown her out of the room. “That’s because of the...” she trailed off and laughed, and Sirius wanted to hit her with one of her stupid books.

“What’s your names then?” she asked the three remaining boys after she had calmed down, and James looked as if she was about to shoot him.

“They don’t have nicknames” Remus stated before Sirius could retort something even meaner, and without missing a beat, he added “yet.”

-

Ever since the fall from the Quidditch field, Sirius had changed, and Remus wondered if it maybe had done permanent damage to his head.

Where the young Black had yearned for attention and touch before, he now kept away and even flinched when Remus tried to pet his hair or lean onto him.

When they had to hex pencils into worms, and back at transfiguration Sirius immediately turned towards James not even casting his other friends a second glance and even at meals he seemed to look down more often than not when all of them were engaged in a conversation.

The constant worrying about this brought the wolf to the edge, and Remus found himself transform more violently and for a longer time each full moon. Even James and Peter seemed to have noticed that something was off since the former asked their dark-haired friend if he had lost his mind lately as he came back from a week-long detention for continuing to wear skinny black jeans with holes in them instead of the slack trousers of the school uniform and safety pins in his ears.

Remus even tried to talk to him about it, on the way to Hogsmeade, at dinner after James had gone searching for Lily and Peter had trailed behind, even during Quidditch practice as they watched their team struggle with heavy rain, but he always blocked off.

The day before the last full moon of the year Remus saw Sirius laughing with two Ravenclaw boys down the hallway and just snapped. Instead of keeping his calm as he would have on any other day of the month, he caught up with them in long strides, thankful for once that his body seemed to grow faster than most, and under the shocked faces of their classmates, he shoved his friend into the next wall.

“Hey!” one of the blue-scarved boys exclaimed because he probably didn’t know that the two figures in front of him were best friends. Or maybe Remus was mistaken in that point by now.

“Are you okay?”, the other boy asked in Sirius direction, and the worry in his voice made the werewolf even madder. He was the only one who was allowed to be concerned about the wellbeing of the young Black and nobody else, especially not those two stupid idiots.

Remus couldn’t help himself but growled as they tried to approach Sirius. A tiny part of him screamed at him, as of why he was such a damn idiot who couldn’t control his anger, but his wolf seemed to be as awake as possible right now.

The Ravenclaw boys flinched back, even though they must have been more confused than scared by the fourteen years old boy in a semi crouching position before them with bared teeth, ready to attack at any moment, but the wolf decided to shift his attention to another prey. Because this was how the animal saw the humans around Remus, as helpless, defenceless, small captures, waiting to be eaten alive.

As Remus' eyes shifted to Sirius though, he saw the way his friend looked at the floor, avoiding his gaze and something inside of him snapped.

As fast as his heightened senses allowed, which was actually pretty fast, the werewolf swirled around and strode off, not looking back once.

If he didn’t retreat now, he might snap some poor defenceless Ravenclaw necks, and that wouldn’t do well for his reputation. Maybe he should head for the shrieking shack right away.

-

“Something is wrong with Remus”, Sirius stated listening to the howling outside of their dormitory windows feeling as helpless as every month. The scene yesterday had taken him aback, not only because Remus defending him made his toes tingle, but also because he hadn’t noticed how his behaviour, which he had only adapted to save all of them from the embarrassment, was affecting his friend.

“Weird, he said the same about you.” James looked at him from his bed with raised eyebrows, but Sirius didn’t turn to him. They were sitting in their shared dormitory, at night, where the full moon was illuminating their faces.

“It’s not my fault”, Sirius wanted to mutter helplessly but didn’t. Instead, he buried his head in his hands, elbows propped on his crossed legs. Something was wrong with him, and if Remus was bothered so much by it that he talked to James about it and almost killed two students, it was probably serious.

He laughed at his own joke, humorlessly, and could only imagine what faces James was casting towards him. He didn’t want to look up because then he would never manage to force out his next words.

“What am I supposed to do?”

James was silent for a few moments, as if he was contemplating if he should ask for the reasons of Sirius strange behaviour, but seemed to take a guess instead. What he had to say, seemed to originate from deep within him as if he had been chewing on it for a while.

“If it is a girl you’re fighting over, probably, I mean Lily maybe, you should probably talk about it with him.”

The first few seconds, Sirius couldn’t even believe James actually said that and just stared at him dumbfoundedly.

Then he erupted into laughter.

It shook his core, came from deep within his body, and he had to steady himself on a post of his bed to not fall off.

It pained him after a few moments, but he couldn’t stop, because James looked at him irritated and couldn’t be further from the truth than he already was.

“You think I want to snog Lily?” Sirius managed to press out after several attempts to do so. By now, he felt more like crying than laughing, especially when a thunderous howl reached their ears from down around the forbidden forest.

James just shrugged. He looked so helpless that Sirius almost started to laugh again, but instead, he followed a weird urge, a thing that was rarely done to him, but he had wished for often and hugged his friend.

James seemed to be irritated about it but started to pet the slightly shorter boy on the back after a few moments. This and the fact that his friend couldn’t see his face might have resulted in Sirius being bold enough to utter the following words, just under his breath.

“I actually don’t think I want to snog any girl. Ever.”

The silence that followed was not uncomfortable. There was no screaming, no shouting, no ordering him to go to his room and punishing him with no food. James could be oblivious at times, but when it counted, he understood.

Sirius realized at that moment that he would follow the Potter boy wherever he went, no questions asked. He had a slight suspicion the feeling was mutual.

“Who do you want to snog then?” James asked with the most serious look on his face after he had sat both of them down on his bed, not seeming to be confused at all anymore. He had his whole focus on his friend, but Sirius found it to be impossible to say it out loud. He instead lifted his chin towards the window, and with the other's eyes going impossibly wide he knew he was understood.

“Is that why you have been...”

“Yes, and I don’t know what to do about it now!” Sirius dug his hands into his long dark hair, looking up to the ceiling as if the answer was written there. “I can’t just go to him and say something like:

‘sorry I acted weird the last few weeks’ and give him a bar of chocolate and then everything is okay, can I?”

“Why not?” James asked, expression open, not judging in the slightest. “What’s the worst that can happen? He’s your friend, and he’s hurt and let’s face it: without him, we wouldn’t survive a day.”

How did I get so damn lucky, Sirius thought. Those were his friends, and no romantic feeling, directed at whoever could change that.

-

Sirius did as he said and made peace with Remus. Who in turn seemed so relieved, that he jumped right into prank planing for the new year. And even if two boys from Ravenclaw always looked at him as if he was going to eat them any second, it couldn’t have been earlier to slip back into their pre-Quidditch-fall dynamics.

Before summer break there were two significant moments though, where Sirius thought - in retrospective -that everybody could have seen, what he actually felt for his favourite werewolf.

The first one was a Defense against the dark arts class in spring, the clouds outside distracting the young Black until a question was asked that would change their all lives.

“If I encounter a Merperson I could just become an animagus and turn into a fish and just swim away, couldn’t I?”, a Slytherin girl in the front row, Sirius had never noticed before, asked.

He stared at James, who seemed to occupied with scribbling in his book to notice. That’s why he elbowed him, earning himself an angry gaze not only from his friend but also from Professor Fernsby who started to answer just in time for the boys to turn their heads towards the board.

“Generally a nice idea, for every magical creature that is more animal than human-like, but I have to disappoint you. Even if you managed to become an animagus, which is not only illegal without permission of the ministry but also very hard and dangerous and takes a lot of time, you couldn’t choose what animal you become. Just to remind you of what you should have learned in last years Transfiguration class.”

His last words were spoken in a sarcastic tone, his strict gaze flitting from student to student as if he wanted to rat them out to Professor McGonagall.

Sirius didn’t care about their teacher at all. James had met his gaze, and after a look of realization had lit up his face, both boys turned towards their shared friend with the countless scars on his face.

A warmth spread so fast through the young Black’s body that he felt his mouth open on its own accord. He was in shock, how could he not be?

There was a way that he could help his favourite werewolf by at least not leaving his side in his darkest hours, and no matter how hard or dangerous, he would do it.

The fact, that it was also illegal because honestly, there was no chance anybody would allow this to the most troublesome boys to help ease the life of their closeted werewolf friend, was definitely a bonus and judging by the smirk on James’ face he wasn’t alone in his opinion.

“We can’t tell him”, Sirius whispered suppressing the urge to pet light brown hair, and his best friend just nodded.

For the rest of the lesson, the two Gryffindor boys had a wide grin on their faces, and even the irritated look of Professor Fernsby couldn’t wash it off.

-

The second time Sirius got scared everybody could read his feelings for his favourite werewolf of his face was after their major exams, on a ridiculously warm summers day, the pain of the upcoming departure momentarily forgotten.

They were down at the lake, the four of them, Evans with some girls and Snivellius who refused to leave the shades or take his black coat off and some fifths years they had met in the Gryffindor common room earlier. They had talked to one of them, Frank, before from times to times but Sirius was well aware of the bubble him and his friends kept around themselves, keeping everyone out effectively most of the time.

James had taken off his T-shirt the moment they got within a hundred-meter proximity of the lake and was starting to run, encouraging Peter next to him to do the same.

Then he grinned back at Sirius, tossing his shirt in his direction and colliding with the water a second later.

His carefree aura was intoxicating, and the young Black found himself laughing, turning around to grin at Remus.

Who wasn’t smiling.

Who had stopped right next to Sirius and looked at the water as if the giant squid was coming to eat him alive.

“What’s up?”, the shorter of them asked in a forced nonchalant tone and threw James shirt underneath the next tree as if he didn’t care too much for the answer. They all knew how seldomly Remus changed in front of them and they all knew it was because of the scars, that was why his next words took Sirius totally by surprise.

“I can’t swim.”

The shorter boy stared up at his friend, on the brink of laughter, but the other's serious face stoped it in his throat. It had never occurred to Sirius, who had been brought up with a rather strict education in basic stuff like writing, calculating, languages and basic sports, that anyone could possibly have missed out on that. Remus shrugged and looked after James.

“My mom always thought of it as too dangerous, you know with me being sick all the time. But I think I will dip my toe in.”

And with that - and an almost determined look on his face - the young werewolf took his oversized T-shirt off and threw it next to James’. Then he took his trousers off, underneath which he wore simple plaid boxers, because why would someone who couldn’t swim own swim shorts and left an unconsciously open-mouthed Sirius next to the tree with them.

There were scars. There were a lot of them, some deeper, some more shallow and some disappearing beneath the waistband, but Remus wore them with such a pride they the young Black didn’t even want to pity him.

How could anybody look so perfect, so broken and still mended, made out of pain but powered by laughter?

This laughter erupted as the brown-haired boy turned around, looking expectantly at Sirius.

“Are you coming?”


	8. The fifth Year (Part I)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Remus reflects on his feelings and three fifteen-year-old boys try to become animagi.

This summer was hot and humid, so much, that Remus spent most of it laying on his bed or on a field close to his parents home and reading all the books his friends had stopped him from over the year.

  
The muggles in the new town they had moved to didn’t mind him, mostly they didn’t even throw a second glance at him even though his newly purchased shorts exposed quite a few scars.

  
They seemed to mind their own business here, and Remus wished for that in wizarding world almost all the time, but the numbers were against him. There were just too few wizards in the UK for them to cast their eyes away when someone was stepping out of line.

  
James, Peter and Sirius wrote a lot of letters. The owls that usually arrived at weird times of the day could have caught the attention of the town people, but humans tended to find the most probable explanation to be right in their mind and this way, they again looked away.

  
Peter had some annoying aunts over at the time, James had gotten an awesome broom as a late birthday present, and Sirius had been locked in his room again for telling Mr Lestrange that he looked like a toad.

  
His letters always worried Remus the most, and he wondered how much his friend didn’t tell him, how much worse it sometimes was to live in that family of dramatic pure-bloods.

  
They also wrote about war and how everybody, besides the Blacks maybe got even more scared by the minute.

  
But they were still students, as he seemingly continuously tried to explain to Sirius and James and what could a group of students actually do against the most powerful dark wizard in history?

  
His mom and his dad had seemingly stopped talking over the last year, and even though it was sad, it was maybe better than the screaming. Due to the fact that Lyall spent even less time at home, there was one less Person with so much remorse and pity in his eyes that it almost overflew.

  
_Aren’t you scared,_ Sirius wrote in one of his letters, _that once we get out of this school alive, there will be nothing left to live?_

  
Remus wasn’t, and he didn’t want to explain this to his friend in too much detail, but he hadn’t actually ever learned to think a lot past the next full moon. It could be over every time, someone could hear him or the wolf could hate the cage so much that he could lash out too much and hit an  
important artery, or anyone around him could turn away, and that was if he was honest probably the worst outcome he could imagine.

  
The sun shone onto his face, through the leaves of an old weeping willow, one that didn’t hit you if you came to close as he read the last words of James’ last letter.

  
_PS: By the way, did Sirius tell you that he met a muggle in some weird music store and had his first kiss? I still can’t believe it wasn’t Lily and I who were first, I mean I don’t think Peter has something going on, do you? Also, you have never kissed anyone before, have you? You would tell me, wouldn’t you?_

  
Some birds had a fight or mated in the leaves high above Remus's head, and he stared in their direction without actually noticing them.

  
Sirius hadn’t told him. And this fact should upset the fifteen-years-old boy the most, but it didn’t sting nearly as much as the thought of his friend. Kissing. Someone.

  
Remus blinked up into the merciless sun folding and unfolding the paper in his hand again and again. For some reason, he couldn’t get the image out of his head. Sirius lips attached to some girl’s, her hands in his hair his hands on her back.

  
What in Merlin’s name was wrong with him?

  
This guy was one of his best friends, if he wanted to snog somebody, Remus should feel happy for him. Glad that he was at least having some fun in his summer.

  
Instead, he felt it rise in his throat again, like he had that day of the encounter with those Ravenclaw boys, that feeling of betrayal and anger and whatever else it was. Of course, this could be related to the upcoming full moon, but it was still a few days away, and Remus had not had this feeling this intense in combination with anything or anyone else than Sirius as far as he could remember.

  
It was jealousy, he had to admit it, and this time it was not about someone stealing his friend away from him.

  
Against his, in ninety-six per cent of the time very calm nature, Remus crumbled the letter in his hand and threw it towards those birds, missing the tree by meters.

  
Maybe he envied Sirius of being able to kiss a girl first, but in the back of his mind, he knew he wasn’t really interested in that right now, with all that was on his plate.

  
Maybe he was worried that someone was using his friend, having not his best interest in mind and luring him away from their group.

  
But that was not it, he had to admit with a sight.

  
The real reason why he was so jealous in that situation was that he wanted to be the one to embrace Sirius, that he wanted to hold him like he did all those nights of nightmares in his Hogwarts bed and press kisses to his face. And run his hands through that wonderful, thick, black hair.

  
How long had he been thinking about his friend like that? How long had he admired his grey eyes and black hair and pale skin; where had been the step, the moment when he had started to feel warmth, thinking about Sirius’ face?

  
Remus rolled over, pressing his face into the short, dry grass beneath him.

  
This couldn’t happen, this was pointless.

  
Love, family, regular life, that was something the young werewolf had only been able to see in other people’s futures and not in his. He had thought that, if he ever managed to leave Hogwarts alive and with an intact reputation, he would work in a muggle office job and keep as low as possible, only earning enough to survive and live in a nice one-room apartment with cellar as far away from the crowd as possible.

  
He had not expected to attach to anyone so thoroughly. And even if he could have a relationship, only for the time he had left at Hogwarts, his very male friend, the ladies man Sirius Black would never ever consider him in a romantic way.

  
That short grass irritated his face, and his stomach started to grumble, indicating that he hadn’t eaten anything since br

eakfast. There wasn’t much food home, especially in comparison to what he was allowed to consume in Hogwarts, but it would do, sating his basic urges. It angered the wolf, he could feel it craving after some raw meat, taken apart by its own sharp teeth.  
This was what this was with his dear friend Sirius, a craving, an urge, that he could never follow upon because he was caged away for other people’s safety.

  
-

  
This year Sirius didn’t make it to their compartment in the Hogwarts Express until about one hour into the ride, and the others honestly considered the possibility that he had missed his train.

  
As he finally entered after sliding the door open, he was laughing and encircled by a group of girls, who, without exception, giggled as if they had eaten giggling gum.

  
In a manner that seemed kind of foreign to Remus, Sirius threw himself on the bench next to James, across from the werewolf and lifted his chin towards the other's chest.

  
“I knew that they love you.” He looked different than before the summer. His hair was even longer, loosely held back by a knot at the back of his head and his nails were painted black. This wasn’t the most significant change, though, as he had never before looked at his friends as if he owned the world. At others, sure, but not at those three boys who knew his darkest secrets.

  
“They do”, Remus answered, touching the red badge, he had already pinned on his robes with a hint of sarcasm in his voice but not really trying. He still felt the unexplainable jealousy, low in his stomach and now he was also angry on top of that. Angry at himself for being jealous of those girls, angry at Sirius for looking at them that way and angry at James and Peter because they didn’t say anything.

  
“Yeah, no idea why they didn’t give it to you”, James remarked, throwing a side glance at his best friend and a chocolate frog at Peter. They had this game, where they had to catch the frog with their mouth before it could jump away and it was of course very convenient when their personal Quidditch chaser was throwing it.

  
“They didn’t want to join us?” Remus could hear in his own strained voice and his jerky chin movement towards the door, that something was bothering him, so the others could probably tell as well.

  
But Sirius had been with those girls for one hour before deciding to join them, and that was not something the werewolf could easily forget.

  
The black-haired boy's look changed into something more familiar like confusion, and he seemed to deflate a little bit.

  
“It’s not close to the full moon,” Sirius muttered and then crossed his arms. Maybe this had been the wrong approach. “What does it matter to you?” he asked louder, defensiveness in his voice and posture.

  
Remus said nothing, and maybe they could have forgotten this incident in the next hours if Peter hadn’t popped up to “help” his friend.

  
“Maybe he’s afraid you wouldn’t leave any to us.” The short boy seemed to become nervous under the glance that everybody was throwing at him now and seemed to have decided to make it worse. Or maybe he didn’t decide anything at all at that moment.

“I...I mean since you already had some over the summer, maybe Remus doesn’t want you to have all of them and... and sh... share...”

  
He trailed off, sweat visible on his forehead, but Sirius didn’t throw him out of the window.

  
Instead, he turned to his best friend, the angriest look on his face any one of them had ever seen there.

  
“You told them?” He sounded defeated, broken and as if his life depended on James answer, but as if he already didn’t want to hear it.

  
James already got into a defensive posture, lifting his hands and seemingly trying to speak calm and quiet.

  
“No, I didn’t I just... I wrote Remus that you snogged somebody and Peter because he asked why I asked if he had ever done it before, I never would have...”

  
For a second, Remus got suspicious of the stress his friend had put on the word somebody, but then Sirius was already up, his look directed at James as cold as ice. And was that relieve somewhere there too?

  
He had turned around and stalked out of the compartment before Remus could have made sure though, and he had a train ride of comforting James ahead of him anyways, so he didn’t continue thinking about it.

  
-

  
The two boys had made up by the end of the train ride. To be honest, there wasn’t much space in the Hogwarts Express and James had found Sirius at the back end by the luggage, alone, pretty quickly. They had sat silently beside one another for some time, on top of a worn suitcase, their minds wandering while the beautiful Scottish scenery passed by the windows.

  
“Why did you kiss him?” James asked after a long time, and Sirius would have definitely bet on the other to break the silence, but not with that.

  
He shrugged, sinking back against the luggage, remembering the smell of cold smoke and his pounding heart.

  
A sudden thought crossed his mind and started bubbling laughter in his throat.

  
“You should have seen his face when he found out I wasn’t even sixteen yet,” Sirius snorted and couldn’t help but throw a short glance at his best friend. He was his best friend, no matter what.

  
“How much older is he? Ten years?” James had lost his serious look as well, and the relieve this caused in Sirius was weightlifting.

  
“Nine,” he laughed and raked his fingers through his already messy hairdo. He had wanted to colour them like the others, red maybe, but then he remembered Remus once saying that the dark colour reflected the madness within him and he could never disappoint his favourite werewolf.

  
Apparently, though he had managed just that.

  
“Why did you tell him?” Sirius asked after another long silence, and he immediately felt his friend shift beside him. He seemed nervous, probably at the other getting angry again but answered nonetheless.

  
“I... I kind of wanted to see if he gets jealous?” He made it sound like a question, but Sirius could actually imagine him sitting at home and thinking he was a genius because he came up with that plan a few weeks prior. “Like, you know, a test, maybe he likes you as well.”

  
The young Black shook his head as violent as possible, not only at the fact that his friend had spoken it out loud but also at the pure thought that he could be as lucky as Remus liking him or any boy in a romantic way.

  
“What about the leaves? You haven’t told him about that as well have you?”

  
Sirius loved new challenges, especially if they distracted him from his other problems, but becoming an animagus seemed to be almost an impossible task.

  
Whoever had invented this must have been mad, as the first task, to hold a mandrake leave in your mouth for a month from full moon to full moon was already insane if you had a storage full of magical supplies. Which they hadn’t.

  
When he looked over to James, though, the Potter boy had put on that mischievous look.

  
“Found this in my old man’s secret cellar room,” he grinned fetching a small phial out of the depths of his coat. Someone had, a long time ago probably, written the words “Manrhhr” on it or something but they still looked like leaves.

  
“Are you sure about this?” Sirius asked suddenly, touching the phial with his fingertips. They still had to find the chrysalis of a Death head something moth or something and some dew nobody had touched, but this was the first step, and they all had been warned by several books that horrible things could happen if you started and then failed. Like half-animal-half-human creatures.

  
Of course, Sirius had already made experiences with that but attending Hogwarts with a beak was probably not allowed.

  
“For Remus.” James had the most honest and serious look on his face, and his friend just nodded.

  
“For Remus,” the other answered taking the phial in his hand. Also because it was illegal but helping their friend was, of course, their main motivation.

  
-

  
They had to wait until the 20th of September for the next full moon to arrive, and, in the meantime, start several attempts to break into Professor Slughorn’s Office without Remus finding out what they were planning. Especially the last task wasn’t an easy one since they didn’t want for their friend to feel left out, but knew if they explained the situation to him, he would probably try to talk them out of it.

  
Professor Slughorn’s Office was also not too easy to break into, but one night, Remus was lying sick in bed, Slughorn had one of his famous parties going to which they weren’t invited to, of course, they managed to enter with the invisible cloak and a previously stolen key. The stealing of the latter had included a gut-wrenching talk about James father and his contributions to the potions world, which he would probably never forget, but the distraction had worked.

  
Now they only had to hope that Slughorn actually stored the Death moth thingi. Maybe they should have written down the name of what they needed, but now it was too late.

  
There were several portraits on the Tapestry Corridor, which pointed their way as Sirius stuck out his hand to unlock the door, but they didn’t seem to care enough to alarm anyone. The room they entered was annoyingly small for three boys to stand in, let alone search the items clad walls, so they decided to send Peter back outside with the invisible cloak as a watchman.

  
In the end, it had been one of their smoothest operations, nothing broke, nobody got alarmed, and they even managed to sneak to the kitchen to get some tea for their furry friend.

  
As they came back to the Gryffindor common room though, a sight they hadn’t expected awaited them. Remus, pale as the full moon and a little bit sweaty, sat on one of the bigger armchairs, facing their direction, in his lap what looked like the last draft of their map. But that map, even though they had found the awesome Homonculous charm in a book of the forbidden part of the library which was supposed to track people and display them as ink dots on a map, didn’t work yet, did it?

  
Remus look of anger seemed to hint otherwise.

  
“I suppose you were not redoing last lessons potion for studying reasons, were you?” Though hoarse, his voice was deep and threatening, and the three boys couldn’t help but feel caught.

  
“It’s working?” Sirius asked instead of answering, though he knew that this would only postpone the matter. He also wanted to distract from the fact, that a bed-haired, hoarse-voiced Remus made a tickling warmth spread through his body and took his breath away.

  
“It does,” the werewolf answered, seemingly unbothered by that fact, even though it had been their major goal for the last year at least. He swung his wand in the air, casually and his eyes were too bright and too glistening for any of the boys to step forward or dare to speak. “Also I have a fever and would like to go back to bed, so if you’d care to explain your nightly adventure to me.”

  
People who didn’t speak Remus would have probably not caught on the slightly hurt undertone, but Sirius understood. Before he could say anything to assure his friend though, Peter piped up, seemingly not being able to hold the tension any longer.

  
“We want to become animagi to help you.”

  
It was silent, in the Gryffindor dormitory, in the middle of the night, Remus eyes wide, as he let the wand and the parchment in his hand sink down to his lap. The werewolf seemed to want to say something, an irritated look to his face, but Sirius didn’t let him.

  
“We’re your friends, Remus. And there is nothing you can do to stop us.”

  
“Also imagine what awesome pranks we could play if one of us turns out to be an insect or some kind of small animal!” James exclaimed, breaking the tension with his enthusiasm.

  
He seemed to want to run to the map and see it but held back for their conversation, which Sirius was rather grateful for, regarding that, he would probably tackle their sick friend to the floor.

  
“You are aware that it’s a very dangerous and complicated procedure?” Remus asked, and Sirius could hear in his tone that he had already started to give in.

  
“Holding a leave in your mouth for a month? Who wouldn’t want to do that.” Sirius grinned, wide, because they were actually doing this and not keeping this a secret from Remus anymore was a huge relieve.

  
“So about that map,” James started, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

  
The werewolf just held it out to him, but his eyes were on Sirius. ‘What do I do with the lot of you?’ his eyes seemed to say in an exasperated yet affection way.

  
Sirius just shrugged and lifted his eyebrows. Then he stepped over to James, who was narrating way too loudly for that hour, that McGonagall, as well as Madam Pomfrey, were sleeping in their own beds and nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary.

  
-

  
The day of the next full moon came with four exited boys and the probably last sunny day of the summer. It was a Saturday, so they didn’t even have classes to distract themselves, and after some arguing back and forth, they decided to go down to the lake and lay in the grass and let the suns warm rays transport them into a delirium-like state.

  
They hadn’t expected for anyone to see them or even follow them, which was why they all jumped, as soon as they heard somebody clear their throat.

  
Sirius, who had his head on James' chest and his feet on Remus's legs sat up first. He didn’t do that that often anymore, cuddling in public like a stray dog who hadn’t bee loved enough, but maybe he had understood that it irritated people. On the other hand, that had never stopped him before in any other cases.

  
The person who had interrupted their dozing was actually a fourth-year Hufflepuff girl with her friends standing close behind. She seemed kind of nervous, the way she wrung some pink paper in her hands, but according to the giggling in the background, she seemed to be the boldest of the group.

  
The wolf roared out of annoyance.

  
“Eem, hi Sirius,” the girl said, and it looked like James could already not contain his laughter. This was not the first time girls tried to talk to Sirius, completely ignoring the rest of the group, but it was the first time the young Black actually grinned up at them.

  
Noticing the way his cheeks rounded and the skin around his eyes crinkled, as well as the sun painting his skin in a warm tone, was a momentary distraction for pre full moon Remus until the girl spoke again.

  
“Eh, I was wondering, you know, if you would maybe like to go on a date with me.” She was holding the pink parchment, which turned out to be a letter for Sirius to take and the rational part of Remus seemed to wonder how many love letters his friend had gotten over the years. The irrational part, say the wolf mostly, wanted to tackle that girl and rip her throat out.

  
Remus shook his head for good measure and noticed how Sirius was looking at him out of the corner of his eye but also James from behind him.

  
‘I’m fine,’ he wanted to say with an apologetic smile, but he had the feeling that it didn’t really work.

  
“I’m very honoured,” Sirius said towards the girl again, and Remus suddenly had a fist full of grass and dirt in his hand. “But I’ll have to decline since I don’t really date.” But you kissed that girl, the wolfy part in Remus wanted to scream.

  
The girl awkwardly thanked him, took the letter and walked away, supported by her girls group.

  
“Man, I wish I was that lucky,” Peter suddenly squeaked as Remus still tried to figure out how to get his feelings under control and the grass back into the floor.

  
“Peter, Peter.” Sirius shook his head and laid back down. “You forget the practical part. How would I be able to snog someone with a leaf in my mouth for the next month?”

  
The joking arrogance in his voice was a mask, Remus knew that, but still, his heart rate didn’t seem to be able to slow down at all.

  
“Maybe you should have told her that you would be free in a month,” James suggested, and that was when the wolf snapped.

  
“I’m gonna go for a run,” was what Remus thought he mumbled towards his friends as he, against the dull ache in his bones, thanks to Lily, got up and walked away. Halfway towards the woods, he fell into a light jog as he could hear his friends call his name behind him. He would never be able to explain his jealousy, so why try to resolve the situation to his friends when he could just run away.

  
Even if he had to run away for the rest of his life.

  
-

  
The last howling of the night echoed away as three boys watched the moon sink and the sun rise. They all had a leave in their mouth, trying to accommodate to the weird feeling of not being allowed to swallow it and trying to find the perfect spot to keep it in for the next month. Though the Mandrake leaves from James’ dad had looked old and kind of crumbly, they didn’t dissolve immediately, which gave Sirius hope that it could actually work.

  
The moment the sun was visible they all got up, none of them having slept that night out of fear of swallowing the leave, and moved down to meet their friend, even if he was usually unconscious at that hour. 

  
Sirius couldn’t help but smile as he followed two of his friends, who were bouncing down the stairs in excitement.

  
The corridors were empty, but that wasn’t a coincidence anymore since the parchments in James’ Hand told him exactly where everybody was. They still had to fuse the floors together in one map and some major parts were still missing, but it was exactly as practical as they had thought it would be.

  
Madam Pomfrey looked at them scoldingly but didn’t say anything as they gathered around the only occupied bed in the room, settling down and keeping their chatting to a quiet whisper. They were trying to figure out how to eat with the leave in their mouth and without looking suspicious, the moment Remus stirred. 

  
“How are you feeling?” James asked, just as their friend opened his eyes while Sirius just grinned and waved at him.

  
“Did you do it?” the addressed retorted without answering. All three boys grinned, the leave between their teeth. Remus chuckle ended in a worrisome sounding coughing fit, but he put off the others’ helping hands.

  
“Do you feel different?” Sirius had to think about that for a moment. His body didn’t seem any different, but it was as if a clock had been started and he really didn’t want to wait a whole month to find out what animal he would become.

  
“I don’t, but James here is already feeling his legs shorten,” the young black answered with an almost straight face and earned himself a meeting with James’ transfiguration book. He wasn’t really worried that it would go wrong. He would save the worry for when bad things would happen. Which was not too far away when one glanced at the newspaper on Remus’ bedside table.

  
“Sirius is sure to become a big scary creature, so he can rip the death eater’s throats out with his own teeth and claws,” James remarked after his gaze had followed his friend’s. They had been talking a lot lately about becoming aurors to fight the evil in the world and defy as many of Voldemort’s servants as possible, but Sirius had made it clear, that he didn’t want to wait that long. They already knew how to fight, didn’t they?

  
“It’s good that we have agreed to finish at least the mandatory part of school, isn’t it?” The persistence in Remus's voice wasn’t even subtle, and the young Black decided to let the argument go as he knew he couldn’t convince his friends just yet. And how could he live all those adventures without them, that wouldn’t be fair.

  
“To become aurors we will have to finish the seventh year,” James piped up, even though he had brought it up in the same discussion at least a hundred times already.

  
“Well, as soon as I am half a bear forever no one will want me to study here anyways, so I can go wild. Imagine it was the top half and no one would recognize me and I couldn’t tell anyone and my parents would be told I was dead and I would be roaming the forbidden forest for the rest of my life.”

  
Peter looked absolutely terrified at that thought, and James threw a pillow at his friend, but what really got Sirius was the hand of the boy on the bed reaching for his, squeezing with about half the strength of a healthy person.

  
“You know we wouldn’t survive losing you,” Remus sighed, but Sirius had already recognized the humour in his voice. “I would probably locate you with the map and try to drink tea with you, but you would always break the cups.”

  
“And then they would probably even make you continue to attend school.” James was grinning widely now. “And you would always break the pens and eat the homework.”

  
“Also we already have a monster in our group, so don’t even try.” Remus's eyes had sobered up again, and Sirius looked down at their joined hands, suddenly aware of the comfort it brought and the way his cheeks heated up as soon as he noticed.

  
“Do you want anything special today?” he asked as he retreated his hand as subtle as possible. Maybe James noticed but he only raised his brows. “Something peculiar to eat or a book from the library.” At the last words, he grimaced as if he couldn’t think of anything worse.

  
“No, but keep me updated,” Remus shook his head and made a motion in the air which hinted at the paper planes they sent each other in class and when one of them was ill. 

  
“Sure will.” Sirius bowed a little as they left, having the image of his broken but always fighting friend burned into his retina. He would keep a whole bouquet in his mouth if it helped him, and he would swallow his feelings until his very probable battlefield induced death.


	9. The fifth Year (Part II)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Even if you are doing a life-changing, possible dangerous and illegal transformation, you should still have some fun!

The next hours and days were filled with them trying to figure out how to manoeuvre around the leave without losing it, and after some time, they almost forgot about it.

The four of them had decided to keep it low this month as it was already risky and illegal enough what they were doing, but a little bit of pranking before the Quidditch season started couldn’t harm anyone, could it?

It wasn’t until three days to the next full moon that they planned something spectacular and worthy of them. It had been James’ idea, and the execution was beautifully prepared, the night they met in the Gryffindor common room, wants in hand, map and cloak prepared.

“So, there has been a change of plans,” the Potter boy blurted our the moment they gathered for a last briefing.

“So, we had planned on exchanging the bells together up in the clock tower, but I remembered just today, that ‘ol Flitwick once told us about the vanishing effects of object lifting magic with weight and distance.”

Everybody looked at him expectantly, but no one except for Sirius seemed suspicious. James usually wasn’t one for safety, and to his best friend at least, it really sounded as if he had had this plan all along.

“So, well, I thought we should split up; Peter and I will be unhinging the bells from up the tower and montaging the new ones, whereas Sirius and you, Remus, will catch the old ones from below, hide them and deliver the new ones to us.”

With a smirk on his best friend's face, the lightbulb turned on inside of Sirius's head.

“What are you planning?” he whispered to James as the others were collecting their stuff even though he was sure he already knew.

“What do you mean?” Potter would not win a price in acting innocently, that was for sure. “You and our little furry friend make a great pair. In crime, I mean, of course.”

Sirius only had a chance to try and kill his friend with a look as the others were ready to go, but James didn’t even seem to notice, busy und folding the map.

He suddenly grinned up in their small circle and lowered his all illuminating wand towards the white piece of parchment in his hand. It wasn’t completely finished yet, but they had managed to come to an agreement on a password after some hushed arguing ing Hogwarts halls and staircases.

They all nodded to signal that they were ready and then started speaking at the same time. Chills rose up their arms in the mostly dark Gryffindor common room in the middle of the night.

“I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.”

-

As they had only one version of the map, they decided that the ground team (Sirius and Remus) should take it as it was far more probable to meet someone in the halls, than it was up in the tower. The other two took the cloak and disappeared fast, which left Sirius to with no choice but to follow the plan and exit the common room.

The two boys didn’t talk as they made their way, from time to time lighting their want and checking the map and the young Black swore to punch his best friend in the nose the next time he met him. Spending the night in the dark alone with the boy he had a major crush upon, but who wasn’t even interested in boys. How could James have been so cruel?

But what was he thinking? This was Remus. Their Remus, the guy who adorably became obsessed with books and lectured his friends and who always managed to make them laugh with his dry sarcasm and who took life lightly, like a feather, as if he hadn’t expected to come this far. He didn’t have a crush on Remus, he loved him. He loved him with all his heart, and he would enjoy his company tonight and burrow his feelings down below. James could bite him if he wanted to.

As they arrived at the base of the clock tower, Sirius marbled for a moment on the quiet castle, the dark stone around them, which seemed awake at day but sleeping now. This was truly a magical place, wasn’t it?

He wanted to turn around to his friend to share his thought but noticed the guy holding an unfolded paper plane in his hand, the lot up want in the other.

He turned the paper for Sirius to read, who immediately recognized the indecipherable scribble of Peter. It said that they had problems and needed more time to untangle the ropes, probably about twenty minutes to half an hour and also for them, the ground team, to hide until they received a signal.

Sirius contemplated to standing around in the darkness of the clock tower, but they could already hear the silence being disrupted by casual chains rattling in the distance. Probably Peeves trying to scare some first years out of their beds.

With a whispered word from Remus and a nod from Sirius, they made their way up the wooden stairs and into the hospital wing. The three boys who weren’t turning into a creature monthly had mastered the art of breaking into the rooms at night if to cheer their friend up when he had to stay for longer periods or secretly increase the amount of chocolate next to his bed. Also, probably because it was illegal, and they loved the thrill, it would give them, but in this case, it was mostly just a nice side effect.

To their luck, there was currently no patient in the long room, and the doors to Madam Pomfrey’s chambers were closed which made their decision to crouch down next to the door behind a bed a lot easier.

There they waited, and Sirius felt the minutes ticking by like hours because he still didn’t know what to say with Remus so close in the dark or if he shouldn’t say anything at all.

He felt his friend sigh next to him the same moment he heard it. It was warm in their hiding spot, cosy and Sirius wouldn’t have minded staying there all night. He kind of wanted to lay his head on the other’s shoulder and knew he would have done so two years ago, but he didn’t want to encourage himself even more to feel those feelings towards his friend.

He shifted the mandrake leaf from one side of his mouth to the Luther as Remus sighed again.

“You have something on your mind?” Sirius asked in a low, sarcastic tone because the werewolf had been against this whole thing from the beginning.

“No, no, just the usual, why by Merlins long and hairy beard, we risk such a stupid “mission” when we can neither risk detention as well as landing in the hospital wing falling on someone’s head.”

Sirius watched his friend in the dim light of the almost full moon while he talked, air quotes and all and couldn’t resist studying him. He looked well, except for the usual shadows under his eyes and the lighting made his scars stand out even more. To anyone who didn’t know him, he could even have looked dangerous.

“Yeah, well, but you don’t need to try to protect us all the time, we are just as well capable of estimating whether a situation is dangerous or not.” Remus raised his eyebrows at that both of them knowing fully well that that was probably not correct.

“I just don’t wanna visit you in the woods,” the werewolf picked up on their previous joke but only half-heartedly. “And I also don’t wanna hurt you when you come with me on full moons, animal form or not.” It wasn’t a new worry, Sirius noticed, but one that had never been brought up in one of their usual discussions.

“You know that they have tried out this wolfsbane potion on real werewolves now. At least that’s what Lily said.” He felt anger rise inside of himself at saying this out loud because he should have been the one to find out about the potion that could tame a werewolf, which had only been invented last year. Why did it have to have been her?

“You don’t have to hate her.” Remus had apparently picked up on his friend’s tone, and the dim light seemed to make him more talkative than usual. Just like it did back in the days when the cuddled up together in Remus bed. “I know that she seems to take your best friend away from you, but she isn’t that bad, I promise.”

I bet you do, Sirius thought but was completely surprised by the werewolf’s next words.

“And honestly, you should be happy for him if he ever manages to get his bullshit together and win her over, since you already had a girl.”

The last part was said very quietly, but Sirius was still taken aback by his friend swearing and the persistence of his tone. It could have been that, or maybe it was the moon or the light or the warm reassurance of the body next to him, but the young black felt the urge to finally come clean about this aspect he had by now accepted as a part of his life forever.

“It wasn’t a girl,” he said just as quiet as the other, not looking up to find out if he was dealing with disgust or shock or something else. Peeves could probably hear his heart beating from the other end of the castle, but he didn’t really care if they were caught by now.

“Oh,” Remus uttered after a moment, but he didn’t sound as if he wanted to run away. Maybe he noticed how they were more similar now, the wizarding world still in denial of all of those who were different from the average.

“Do you like him?” Sirius looked up at that, finding only honesty in his friend’s eyes, not a hint of irritation or disgust. He shifted the leaf in his mouth and then shrugged.

“I mean he’s a cool guy but...” he knitted his brows together remembering the night, the loud music, the smoke. “I mostly did it to try it, you know? Maybe Voldemort tries to invade Hogwarts next week, and that would have been it for me.”

“Because you would fight him with bare hands,” Remus said with a smile, and Sirius grinned back. It wasn’t even a question.

Sirius suddenly noticed by feeling the other’s breath on his skin, how close they had gotten, both of them searching for warmth in the cold, dark castle. His heart rate rose again, from a different reason this time, and he wanted to retreat until he saw and felt his friend’s eyes flicker down to his lips.

It could have been an illusion, a wishful imagination, so Sirius decided to test the situation and lean just a little closer, only a few inches.

They somehow met in the middle.

He didn’t know how or why, but suddenly there were warm lips on his, and he should probably close his eyes even though at closer regard he noticed that they were already closed. They were still for a moment until Sirius took a deep breath in, feeling as if he was high on the air around Remus and properly executed the kiss, even though he had only done it once before and hadn’t they also talked about the problems of kissing with a leaf in your mouth?

-

Remus felt as if somebody had taken the floor away under his feet, and he was falling. Face forward.

He hadn’t planned on kissing his friend, he hadn’t even planned on his heart speeding up and his skin tingling just as he sat close to Sirius in the almost-darkness. It wasn’t as if this wasn’t what he had dreamed about forever, though. Or maybe just a few months, since he had heard about his friend being kissed by somebody else.

He suddenly felt a hand on his scarred cheek and would almost have pulled away if the boy he adored hadn’t deepened the kiss then and there.

Remus had no idea about kissing, and he didn’t know how he had the brain capacity to think about that now, but he had never really thought he would need to. But now, even though the touch of Sirius's tongue on his felt like a thousand small electrical shocks all over his body, he was worried that he wasn’t responding properly. He just knew he never wanted the other to stop.

The muffled gong of a big bell sounded the moment Remus touched the leaf in Sirius's mouth with his tongue, and both boys moved apart pretty quickly. The shorter of them didn’t even seem to have time to look at his friend in panic but got up and ran out of the door immediately.

Remus needed longer, making his legs work properly and noticed how they were shaking.

When something went wrong, they were supposed to get to the Gryffindor tower as quick and as unnoticed as possible, but the young werewolf decided to go and see if he could save his friends from probably life-changing detention.

Madam Pomfrey didn’t think of that as such a good idea though.

“Mr Lupin?” her voice sounded sleepily behind him as he was just about to slip through the door. After freezing up and cursing internally about the fact that the others had a lot more practice at sneaking in and out of this place, he turned around.

“Yes, Madam Pomfrey,” he said in a low, hour-appropriate tone desperately searching his still clouded brain for a plausible reason for him to be here. But what was he worrying about, he was probably the person in the castle who spend the most time here, except for Madam Pomfrey probably. “I... didn’t feel too well, and you know with the upcoming full moon I thought I’d see if you still had some of that potion ready, but then you were sleeping, and I didn’t want to-“

“Hush,” she cut him off, already shooing him towards one of the beds and grabbing the key for the medical cabinet out of her night grown pocket on the way. “You can wake me anytime, you hear that? To be honest, I actually think I got woken by the sound of a bell before that, probably Peeves trying to annoy the bones out of us. You haven’t seen him on your way, have you?”

Remus shook his head as he sat down on the bed. He still had the map, but couldn’t check on it until madam Pomfrey had gotten back to bed.

When she had done so, cursing Peeves one more time, the young werewolf lit his wand under the covers.

It had been about half an hour since the kiss and Remus friends were already back in their beds by now, probably wondering if the werewolf had been caught or just hidden very well. At least all of them had made it back safely, and Remus only stared at the label that said Sirius Black for the next half an hour or so until his eyes closed on their own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this is not the end of fifth year as you could probably guess, but I needed to split this one up over more than two parts^.^


	10. The fifth Year (Part III)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Full moons, transformations and two boys in love. Will they find their way to each other?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry so much for the long break. This real life is sometimes really getting in my way! ;)

The full moon came without Sirius recognizing Remus presence once.

The werewolf was late to class the day after the kiss because Madam Pomfrey had thought of him as too sick to be woken up and the other hadn’t even looked his way when he came in.

Later Sirius seemed to always find some excuses to ditch their group and didn’t show up for any meals. It was so weird that even Peter acknowledged it even though he had to concentrate the most to not swallow the leaf while eating.

The evening of the full moon, Remus returned from the library to get his hospital bag and wish his friends good luck, but they were already gone when he arrived in the dorms.

They had told him of the spot in the woods where they would get their dew, a small cave, they had found during detention in the forbidden forest in third year and where they also had enough moonlight to add the leaf.

For the stupid Mandrake leaf had to be added in the moons rays but the dew, which was added after some hair of the person, was not allowed to have seen the sun or the underside of a human foot for seven days. Who came up with this unpractical stuff?

Of course now it was way too late for Remus to go to his friends as the late summer sky was already painted red and he needed to hurry to get to Madam Pomfrey.

The transformation was horrid this time, every bone of his body breaking one too many times. Since he knew of this new Wolfsbane potion, Remus had held onto the thought of it, how it apparently made the wolf weaker and him in control, but there were no new information on how the testing was going and when or if it was save for him to take.

He had wondered in the cold dark aftermath of the dusty shack, where the ministry got their werewolves to test on from, but he supposed that the obvious thought was the most probable. Askaban.

Light was slowly creeping through the wracked blinds in front of the windows and Remus wondered not for the first time what he would do if that was the place they would send him to once he was out of school. He was very aware that for a society of misfits, prison was often the only possible place for those it was in denial of.

Those morning hours were when the werewolf had the most time to think, since Madam Pomfrey couldn’t be sure it was safe to get him and his muscles were too clenched for him to move. As he lay there, on the dirty wooden ground, completely naked and in fetal position and in too much pain to fall asleep, his mind wandered to his friends and one boy in particular. One boy, who wore his heart on his tongue but wouldn’t, by the love of Merlin, look Remus in the eyes.

It made sense, didn’t it, the werewolf thought to no one in particular. When he focused his eyes he could see the claw marks in the wooden tiles next to his head.

He wasn’t a person to be with, and Sirius had made a mistake back in the hospital wing. There was no future for them, not even a present, since Remus was a monster and even though the others always said they disagreed, it could be over every month. He could hurt someone, kill someone.

There was no future for him in the wizarding world, no future for a monster that liked to kiss boys. One boy, Remus corrected himself.

But Sirius had his glamorous life ahead of him, he would become an auror, defeat the evil and work his well paid dream job for the rest of his life.

Remus shivered, wishing he wasn’t this pathetic, self pitying creature but the transformation he had just gone through made it especially hard. He didn’t know how to describe it, but in this tiny shaking house, his heart screamed for him to make it right, to swallow his pride and beg Sirius to take him back, in whatever form possible, because he couldn’t imagine life without him.

-

The moment he opened his eyes, he tried to remember how he had gotten in this soft, white bed. The pain mainly concentrated on his left arm and his head for now, so he estimated shifting up the bed as a relatively safe procedure.

He was in the hospital wing, and there were two boys sitting on the bed next to him playing wizard’s chess. Two boys, not three.

“Where is he?” No hello, no “did it work?”

James looked up from the board, and there was pain in his eyes. Pain and maybe frustration. But Remus couldn’t focus on the latter, there was no brain capacity as his airways closed off.

“I have no idea what happened to him or if he just… But he won’t come. I’m sorry.” Now James even looked appologetical even if it clearly wasn’t his fault.

“It’s okay,” Remus tried nonchalance, shrugging his shoulders a little, his voice hoarse. “It’s not your fault.”

“He’s been like this since the bell malheur. Did something happen before we had to retreat?” If he didn’t know better, he would have thought that James was suspecting something in particular but he couldn’t know about the kiss, could he? Remus shook his head, looking down at his bandaged right arm.

So, Sirius hadn’t become half an animal, but just wouldn’t visit him in the hospital wing anymore. That especially hurt, since the werewolf’s three friends usually went to such great lengths to comfort and help him and now it was as if one of them had cut him out of his life. As far as that was possible if you lived in the same castle.

“Did it go well last night?” Remus tried to focus back on his two remaining friends, who he found still looking at him.

“Everything according to plan”, Peter answered the moment he bit into a chocolate frog.

“Yeah, we hid the phials well.” James smiled but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Now we only have to wait for a thunderstorm and not forget to say those stupid four magical words every morning and evening. Anima, Anime, Ani… something or so.” He looked at Peter but the smaller boy just shrugged.

“I hope you wrote that down,” Remus remarked, feeling laughter rise in his throat and a smile take over his face. Maybe Sirius had given up on them, on him, but at least he wouldn’t end up a monster as well. He could almost hear his voice, that Remus wasn’t a monster, that he was too hard on himself, but he wasn’t here, he was somewhere doing something with somebody.

Remus had never thought of himself as a bitter person. Hadn’t he, only hours ago decided, that Sirius was better of without him? On the other hand he had apparently also abandoned his only two other friends and that wasn’t fair for any of them.

“I think he’ll come back,” James suddenly said, his eyes fixed on the chess board this time.

Before Remus could respond, Peter uttered a confused “He lives in the same room as we do” and then ordered his knight to do something even the werewolf knew was stupid.

“Peter here has a point.” James killed the knight in a swift but brutal motion. “At some point he will have to talk to you… to us. After all he is still in the same castle.”

At hearing that thought again, Remus decided there had been enough sulking, at least for the sake of his friends.

“You’re right,” he said, lifting his blanked and hoping to seem as effortless as he wanted to. The only bandages he could see or feel were on his right arm and around his head, but he bet that the latter just came from the wolf banging his head on the floor again out of frustration. He didn’t remember putting his pajamas on this morning in the shack, but he hoped it had been him and not poor Madam Pomfrey.

The moment his feet touched the ground, the world spun around him and the strict voice of their matron sounded his name from the other end of the room.

“Where does the young man think he’s going?” she asked, having reached his bed now and looking as if she wanted to tie him to it.

“I’m fine,” Remus heard himself say, even though, of course, he wasn’t, but there were more important things now. He needed the map. And clothes. “Need to go to the toilet,” he added, blinking the diziness and fatigue away that came with fighting a small building as a terrifying creature for one night.

He felt the stares of three people in his back, but they couldn’t change his mind now. Sirius had good ideas sometimes, but this wasn’t one of them.

-

The sun was warm and bright and he wished he hadn’t come out here.

Sirius lay on his back in the grass near the lake and all the laughing people around him made too much noise.

He hadn’t slept last night after hiding the phial, to be honest he hadn’t really slept in days.

Stupid him, stupid Remus for returning the kiss and stupid world.

Hadn’t that been everything he had wanted for roughly the last year? Hadn’t he wished to have Remus for himself, and Remus to be wanting him too?

But in the improbable case of his werewolf friend having actually meant the kiss, of which Sirius wasn’t really convinced yet, there was no way he could drag Remus with him.

Before the night with the bells the possibility hadn’t been there, it had been only him, Sirius with his desires and feelings and no chance of them being returned. But what if Remus actually felt the same? What if seeing Sirius sped his heartbeat up as well, what if he also felt a warmth seep through him at a touch and what if he wanted to kiss his friend just as badly as the other wanted to?

No, there was no way this would happen, Sirius thought, eyes still closed as a random girl called his name, probably to get him to join them in the water.

He was toxic. He was troublesome and his future only held two possibilities for him, either death through a Death Eater or a life of rebellion, in the underground, in the streets, in the muggle world, but there was no way he would join wizarding society, with Voldy or without.

He had just seen too much of its worst, too much discrimination and hate to last for a lifetime.

Remus on the other hand didn’t deserve not to have the quiet calm life he had always dreamed of, the picked fence, the two children probably and the attachment for life.

Suddenly the irritating sun went away and Sirius felt the pleasant coolness of a shadow on his face, but it wasn’t the world ending early, but a person leaning over him.

And this person was Remus.

“You done running away?” the taller boy asked and Sirius needed a moment to blink and scoot into a sitting position before he could take in the other’s appearance.

Remus looked like shit. He was wearing some brown pants Sirius knew he had been wearing for at least the past two weeks and his favorite oversized knitted sweater. It seemed as if he had attempted to make his hair presentable by combing through it but the big white bandage around his head destroyed any attempts immediately. Sirius eyes finally landed on his friend’s face and he wished he hadn’t gone there.

Besides the dark rings under his eyes and and the general tiredness that made him seem years older than he actually was, Remus also had a look of pure rage on his face.

Sirius opened his mouth, probably to talk even though he didn’t know what to say, but the werewolf beat him to it.

“I understand that you might not want to have anything to do with me but you can’t go around deserting your friends like this.” The young Black noticed how some of the other students looked over to them but no one wanted to come closer. “No wait, I also don’t understand why you don’t want to have anything to with me anymore because it was you who initiated the kiss, but the other thing is more important,” Remus added and Sirius looked around again if anyone had eavesdropped.

“Maybe we should talk about this somewhere more quiet,” he jumped in standing up and putting a hand on his friend’s shoulder because he honestly didn’t look as if he could stand for a lot longer. “Somewhere you can lie down preferably.”

Remus, surprisingly strong for the time of the month, shook the hand on his arm off and turned around to stalk off. To Sirius surprise he didn’t turn towards the castle though, but towards a path leading around the lake through a light forest.

The young Black just followed, not knowing how he should argue with a Remus this angry. Why didn’t people come with manuals, dammit.

When they were out of sight of the other students, the werewolf just stopped and Sirius helped him to lower himself down on a patch of moss because he would probably have fallen otherwise. It was already bad to see your friends hurt when it wasn’t your fault, but Remus was definitely only out here because of what Sirius had done. Or not done.

They were overlooking the lake as they sat side by side, a lot farther away from each other than just a few nights ago and Sirius started to pick on the moss without really noticing.

“Why did you kiss me?” Remus asked, slicing the silence apart and maybe only Sirius heard the added “if you would only run away afterwards”. He retrieved his wand from behind his ear and made the moss lumps fly into the lake one by one.

“Why did you kiss back?” Sirius asked back because he didn’t know what to answer.

They were just two teenage boys but somehow their lives were so complicated. Or maybe everybody their age thought this way and in the end others had way more complicated situations to solve.

“It would be stupid.” Remus was looking ahead and not at Sirius, but the shorter boy could see in his profile that he had thought about it just as much. “It would be stupid to begin or continue a relationship between the two of us.” His voice turned quieter with every word and Sirius had trouble understanding him, even though he knew exactly what he meant. They shouldn’t do this.

“People say were stupid already,” was what emerged Sirius mouth even though he hadn’t planned to.

It was now Remus turn to look at him, surprise written all over his face.

“So what makes it stupid actually?” the werewolf asked but Sirius could make out that it was supposed to be a rhetorical question. He answered anyway.

“The wizarding society wouldn’t approve.”

“It could end our friendship.”

“I don’t want to drag you into the mess that is my life.”

At that Remus suddenly laughed, loud and surprised and it only lasted for a few seconds but it still made him need to recover from a coughing fit.

“I should have known you would have thought like that.” Why did he grin? What was funny about them wanting something and not being able to get it?

“I also don’t want to drag you into the mess that is my life.” The smile on Remus face turned warm and Sirius couldn’t stop himself from staring at the werewolf. How did he deserve such a person in his life, so pure and _human_.

“Then let’s not think about our life,” was what came out of Sirius mouth, again without him thinking about it, a tingling sensation starting underneath his skin at the thought.

“All right.” Remus nodded and then looked up towards the birds chirping above their heads in the tree tops, which Sirius had tuned out until now.

“You really want to?” he asked because he couldn’t stop himself.

Remus just leaned in, slowly to give Sirius time to escape but there was no need to wait for this any longer. The werewolf’s lips were warm and soft and the both of them still didn’t really know how to do this but it didn’t matter. They had each other for now and anything else was to be figured out at another time or never.

“What if we get expelled because someone finds out?” Sirius asked after some time, Remus hand in his and a small stone castle in the building before them. It wasn’t too warm in the shadows of the trees and the shorter boy should really urge his werewolf back into the hospital wing to get some much needed sleep.

“Then we’ll go fight some Death Eaters of course,” Remus grinned making his eyes shine. They really had a stony way ahead of them but maybe it was better to walk it together.

-

The thunderstorm came on the 8th of October.

They were really lucky, that it happened so soon but then again it wasn’t winter yet where those became really rare.

Sirius found his way back easily into their midst and Remus awoke every morning to three boys, standing in the middle of the room as if praying and chanting the actually correct words: “Amato Animo Animato Animagus”. With their wands places over their hearts and their solemn expression, one could believe for a second that they were serious about all of that, but them breaking out in laughter or playful fights right after proved that theory wrong.

They hadn’t decided yet how and if to tell James and Peter about their otherwise secret relationship, because it was new and they weren’t even sure how to manage it without anyone putting additional pressure on them but, of course, James beat them to it.

It wasn’t as if they’d had a good chance to begin with as they shared a room with the two of them and they couldn’t be wandering of in the woods all the time without someone noticing, so it was only a week after a full moon when the Potter boy walked in on them kissing.

It had been just kind of an innocence kiss, they had spend the Saturday afternoon curled up around each other in Remus’ bed, just as they had when they were younger and just talking about this and that. Sirius had laughed at the werwolf’s dry sarcasm or something and Remus had carded his fingers through the thick black locks on his boyfriends neck. In this position, as awkward as it was, Remus had felt the sudden urge to just plant a kiss on the other’s grinning mouth and hadn’t been able to stop doing so as he was kissed back.

It was about five minutes later or it could have been five hours, when the door of their dormitory flung open with so much force that it hit the wall.

James had just grinned, told them how happy he was for them and closed the door again. Remus and Sirius were sure that this wasn’t the end of it, that they were going to be taunted and annoyed by their fellow mischief seeker, but they seemed to have been wrong.

In the evening of the same day they sat down Peter to explain it to him, and he just nodded a little bit confused and then remarked how he could now go out with all the girls, since Sirius and Remus were unavailable and James only had one girl in mind. They also explained that he couldn’t tell anyone about it since it kind of was a life or death or better: life or expelled situation but as he always kept quiet about their other adventures no one was worried.

It was almost as always if one didn’t regard the fact that they were waiting impatiently for a thunderstorm to transform themselves into unknown animals, possibly for life but aside from that they kept annoying teachers, students and whoever crossed their paths and deserved it.

And if Sirius sometimes stole a kiss from Remus between classes in empty hallways or there were hearts between all the other stuff they drew each other in class everyday, nobody seemed to be bothered by it.

The day of the thunderstorm, though, had all four of them on the edge of their seats as they watched the dark clouds gather through the classroom windows. They were completely sure that it was the the day, or rather night, when they left the great hall after dinner and there was loud thunder rolling in the distance.

They seemed unable to speak, but they were also sure that everything had been said already. That Remus was worried about all of them, that James hoped none of them became a toad and that Sirius secretly wished to become something that could run fast or fly far away. Peter on the other hand had uttered yesterday that if something went wrong, Remus shall still visit them and bring his favourite sweets to which the other promised exactly that.

They were under the cloak in no time, four almost grown boys not really fitting under, but it didn’t matter that their feet were visible regarding the pitch black sky and the pouring rain that had established itself in only minutes.

They were soaked when they arrived at the cave were the phials were hidden their rain protective spells failing again and again every time a bright light split the darkness and the thunder rolled only seconds after.

They positioned themselves in a circle on the moss of a clearing watching as lightning danced across the dark sky until they were sure the thunderstorm was as close as it would get.

Remus nodded at his friends, acknowledging how they did this for him and noticing how they all nodded back, determined, even if Peter’s phial was shaking a little.

There could have been a lot to say in this at least for them kind of historical moment, but the only thing they managed was the incantation for a last time.

“Amato Animo Animato Animagus.”

They downed the phials and Remus could feel the time slowing as he watched his friends develop a look of disgust on their face and then surprise.

Peter was the first to shrink. Then Sirius fell over on his hands and James’ legs grew longer. It would have looked hilarious how antlers grew out of James’ forehead and a wave of black fur swashed over Sirius’ back if it wasn’t such a dangerous procedure.

Then it all was over, far quicker than if it had been werewolf transformations and Remus found himself in the middle of the woods with a stag, a black dog and a pile of clothes.

“Where did Peter go?” the werewolf asked no one in particular because he knew the animals couldn’t answer.

The moment the dog moved his paw to lay on top of the clothing pile, it started to move and the dog sprung back again, but only that the dog was actually Sirius and Remus had to remind himself of that.

Actually he didn’t, because Sirius was suddenly Sirius again, human face and clothes and all and approached the pile again, a concerned stag at his side.

“He has forgotten to will his clothes to transform with him”, he remarked, way calmer than Remus felt and retrieved something from the place were Peter had stood only minutes ago.

It was a rat. There was a rat in Sirius hand and it squeaked and looked as if in panic and the stag that was James looked completely taken aback and Sirius dropped the rat that was Peter and Remus couldn’t hold the laughter in anymore that had been building inside of him since he had seen Peter shrink.

Sirius looked at him in surprise but then joined in, followed by a again human James even Peter grinned after he had put his clothes back on.

The storm around them had apparently passed and they decided to go back in the castle to celebrate with some hot chocolate and sweets, but only after James and Sirius had what they called a test run of who was the fastest animal. Peter declined, still a little bit shaky but remarked to Remus that he was glad his animal was able to hide easily as they waited for their friends.

This way four wet haired boys ended up on their respective beds in their pajamas with steaming mugs in their hands and laughter on their faces.

As Sirius climbed over to Remus to curl around his outstretched legs, James raised his eyebrows announcing that they needed “ground rules”.

“I just mean there is not going to be any touchy touchy while Peter and I are here and everybody sleeps in their own beds.” Remus couldn’t see if Sirius was embarrassed by that but he felt his own cheeks beaten just as the boy on his legs threw a knitted pullover from the other boy’s trunk at James.

“Hey,” he protested weakly, after all they were all really tired and the hot chocolate made his senses mushy, but he was immediately spoken over by the start of what seemed to be one of his two friend’s famous fights.

“I can sleep wherever I want!”

“Yeah, but it’s not fair, could I go over to the girls dorm and sleep in Lily’s bed? No. And also I don’t want to hear your hanky panky.”

“You couldn’t sleep in Lily’s bed because she wouldn’t let you that’s why,” Sirius retorted and Remus raised his eyebrows at Peter, communicating nonverbally. Both fighting boys were sitting in their beds upright now, tiredness forgotten.

“Of course, I will show her my big antlers and she will...”

“Before that happens you will probably prong her with them.”

“You’re just jealous that you didn’t get such a deathly weapon like I did!”

“We all know they are a result of your arrogance Mr. Prongs.”

“Yeah well, if I’m Mr. Prongs, which is an awesome name by the way, you are Mr... Mr...”

James gaping like a fish trying to find an insulting nickname for a big black dog was only overthrown in its wittiness by Sirius crossing his arms over his chest and raising his eyebrows at him.

“Mr. Paw, Mr. Padfoot, hah!” James grinned now, fight forgotten and swirled around to Peter who seemed just as surprised as Sirius.

“And you’re gonna be Mr. Wormtail and Moony is Mr. Moony and together we are the Mischief makers!”

Remus couldn’t stop himself; he toppled off the bed laughing.

From the floor he could see the grimace Sirius made at his best friend and the wheels turning in his head.

“We need a better name for us,” he stated looking down at Remus expectantly. “What do you think bookworm?” He had this smile on his face, that he only directed at Remus, the werewolf had found out or in a slightly changed version at people he wanted something from.

“A word for prankster, for a group of people roaming the castle at night and doing illegal stuff, conquering, having mastered the art of mischief and having their back at any time? What about...” he made a dramatic pause, all three boys staring at him as he lay half on the floor and half on his bed.

“The Marauders.”

“That’s it,” James exclaimed before anybody else could react. “I will get the map and write an introduction for us, so if anyone ever gets their hands on it they will know what legends we were, how we reigned over this castle, how we owned the night, how we-“

This time it was a pillow that landed in James face and Remus didn’t even care that it was his.

They would conquer this world together.

For now or forever.


	11. The fifth Year (Part IV)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Their first shared full moon is ahead of them. Let's see who gets to exit this experience unhurt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise, this is the last chapter in the fifth year. ^^

The first full moon after the thunderstorm was awaited by all of them impatiently.

In those not even two weeks Remus found Sirius bouncing in his seat in class, James talking to them excitedly instead of at Lily as she walked by and Peter refusing snacks in their studying time repeatedly. He also found himself unable to read a whole sentence while studying for transfiguration, and that could turn into a bigger problem.

Maybe his concentration problem also came from a black-haired, cuddly boy, who seemed to be around him almost all the time. This was not to be misunderstood, of course; the werewolf loved the company of his boyfriend especially after having been ghosted before, but he still rather preferred it when nobody placed their head on his book mid-study and exclaimed loudly how boring libraries actually were.

“Well some of us need to study to pass,” Remus replied then calmly, laying another book on top of Sirius’ head and pretending to continue reading. He had never been able to be angry for long, at the boy with the stunning grey eyes and dark black locks, and soon he started to pet his hair and scratch him behind his ears absentmindedly.

When they studied outside, which it was slowly becoming too cold for, Sirius even sometimes transformed into his dog form, what made it even harder for Remus not to pet him.

Because of all this excitement and because the universe not so secretly hated him, the day of their first shared full moon started with Remus being unable to sit up in bed. He had closed off the curtains to read the night prior, which left him with nothing but to cry for help in his compromised position. Thankfully James’ face appeared fast through the curtains, his grinning face shifting to worry as he saw the look of pain on the other’s.

“Where are the others?” was the first thing Remus asked, but really, he was just asking for one other person who always worried way too much for his own health.

James, instead of answering directly, sat down on the werewolf’s bed, shoving a hand through his already messed up hair. 

“They’re already at breakfast,” he said in a low voice as if he was speaking to a spooked animal. “Is there anything I can do? Call for Madam Pomfrey? Carry you to the hospital wing?”

Remus let out a huff at the last question, which was clearly attempted to make him laugh and had to close his eyes because his ribcage seemed to be exploding at the change of breathing pattern.

“There is something you can do, but you’re not gonna like it.”

James furrowed brows indicated that he had no idea what his friend was talking about, but he nodded anyway. The problem with what Remus was going to ask was that James hadn’t spoken to Lily in exactly five months, two weeks and one day, and the werewolf only knew that exact number because both of them kept reminding him about it. 

The thing with James and Lily was that he had been annoying her from their first day of Hogwarts on, thinking it would make her like him. Of course, it had only made her annoyed at first, but when he had started to put lilies on her table before lunch instead of bugs somewhere in third year, Remus had noticed how her tone had changed when she spoke about him. 

There was no way, the werewolf could tell James that though because he had sworn to Lily he wouldn’t, and because of this, James had come up with the awesome idea last year to just stop acknowledging her. “Because she would come to her senses on her own” or something because they were meant to be together, as James told everybody who didn’t want to know.

Now, Lily had acknowledged his awesome plan, but only to Remus and that on a daily basis. Which made it awkward for James to talk to Lily because it had been so long and also because before it had mostly been one-sided conversations and angry glares from the other side.

“It would be awesome if you could go to Lily and ask her for that potion, she makes for me. I didn’t see her the last days and honestly forgot, or, well, thought it wouldn’t be that bad.”

James looked at him sceptically but then nodded again.

“I can do it,” he muttered more to himself and started to get up. Remus had to hold him back for a moment, though.

“One other thing. Don’t tell Sirius. Tell him to go to Hogsmeade with you directly after breakfast because you need to get something immediately. Please,” he added, trying to smile a little bit. Why did it have to be a Sunday? James nodded another time and left Remus alone and feeling pathetic. 

The truth was, he did love it when Sirius comforted him, but what they had was so new, that he didn’t want for himself to be made into the person of the relationship who needed to always be cared for. He wanted to be equals, and with his condition, he would only get that if he kept his problems hidden.

-

Sirius stormed out of the great hall as if there was a group of Dementors after him.

He had spent the day listening to James’ excuses and stupid reasons why he shouldn’t go see his boyfriend. It had taken him until lunch to understand what his friend was trying to do by distracting him from going back to their dormitory while dragging him into every single shop in Hogsmeade.

It had taken him until dinner to get rid of the boy because he would hang onto him and scream when he wanted to leave.

James and Peter were now glued to the bench in the great hall, food in front of them, so no harm done, and Sirius made his way up the Gryffindor tower skipping all the steps. He had a tray full of Remus favourite food items with him, floating next to him at a flick of his wand, but it was possible that the other boy didn’t want to eat anything at all.

He stormed into their shared dormitory, opening the door with a little more force than it was necessary just to face a Remus in bed, propped up against the pillows, book in his lap.

“You’re angry,” the werewolf stated calmly before Sirius could start with his rant about whatever he had been angry about a few seconds ago.

“Yes, I was held hostage all day long, but that doesn’t matter now. How are you feeling?” He lowered himself down onto the occupied bed and the tray on Remus’ other side. Sirius reached his hand out to lay onto his boyfriend’s arm to have any kind of comforting contact but lowered it onto the bedsheets instead.

“Nervous, that I might kill you in a few hours. Also nervous, that you might beat me to it right here, right now. Glad that I can move my upper body again, but anxious that Madam Pomfrey might need to carry me to the shack if my legs don’t get better soon.” He let out a small huff at that prospect and Sirius had the sudden urge to tell the other that he was  _ cute _ which he definitely didn’t follow up on.

“I’m not gonna kill you”, Sirius said, looking down on his hands which were suddenly taken into warm, scarred ones. “James, on the other hand…” It felt good to grin at Remus and have him grin back, even though there was still a sour taste in the back of Sirius’s throat.

“Why did you keep me away, though? I could have helped.”

“By running around the room worriedly?” Remus asked back lifting his eyebrows. There were empty potion phials on the bedside table and Sirius could see in the other’s eyes that he didn’t mean it as harsh as it sounded to him. “I had my potions; there was nothing you could have done. And didn’t you enjoy your day in Hogsmeade, having fun with the others.”

“No, I didn’t enjoy myself”, Sirius spat out, and he knew he was being over dramatic, but he couldn’t help it. “I don’t wanna have fun while you are up here, in pain and I’m very good at helping, because I know for a fact, that for me at least it helps at least a little to be hugged when you’re in pain and in general to have people near who love you and if you push me away again because you think you’re bothering me, I will glue myself to you’re bedpost, just as I glued James and Peter to the Gryffindor table earlier.”

Remus’ eyes widening was followed by him erupting in laughter and Sirius following shortly after.

“They’re gonna be pissed”, the werewolf remarked as soon as they had calmed down enough. Sirius traced a big scar on his arm, making him shiver.

“Well, we’ll see who’s pissed the most tonight I suppose.” There was a worried crease creeping in between Remus’ eyebrows but his boyfriend was having none of that. “Don’t push me away, do you understand?” He looked steadily into amber eyes and understood that he had tendencies to do exactly as Remus had done. “I’m here for you, just as you are here for me when I have a nightmare or want to do stupid life ending things.”

Remus nodded, looking down towards his legs.

“Did James tell you that he talked to Lily?”

-

Remus was out of the bed before the sun set. Apparently, the wolfs healing skills increased even more in the last few hours before the transformation, and he felt as good as new and a little bit jittery as they spoke their plan over for a last time.

Peter was to turn just after Remus would have left, so the three boys would fit better under the invisible cloak. Then after Madam Pomfrey would have exited the secret passage under the Whomping Willow, they were to wait until they would hear the first howls, because Remus wasn’t sure how the wolf would act if he met other animals during the painful transformation. Peter was then supposed to run to the point that Madam Pomfrey always touched to immobilize the tree, because he was so small that it wouldn’t notice and smash him, probably. The short Gryffindor looked a little bit nervous at that but didn’t complain.

The next step was for the other two to get into the passage and then turn so that no one could see them, but the wolf would also not come in contact with their human scents.

So far so good but after having been left by Madam Pomfrey, Remus just sat on the floor of the upstairs bedroom of the shack, naked because he didn’t want to rip his clothes, his arms around his legs and his thoughts turning as if they were inside of a blender.

He should never have allowed this; he should not bring his friends in this kind of danger. Even if he had received his first-ever treatment of the first version of the Wolfsbane potion because he had literally begged for it almost every day for the past few weeks, he didn’t feel as if the people he loved the most besides his parents should be close to the horrible monster he would become.

The other dominant worry he had was that no one had ever seen him in his full wolf form, apart from his parents when it had happened for the first time, and he was irrationally self-conscious, that his friends wouldn’t want anything to do with him afterwards if they were still alive.

There was no turning back now though, he thought, while he felt his bones stretch and his skin tighten. 

When his eyes burned and his teeth grew longer, and he was still crystal clear in his mind, he knew something was different this time. There was a standing mirror right next to the door, and Remus watched in astonishment for the first time in his life, how his snout grew, hair sprang from every visible skin patch, and he became  _ something _ that was unmistakable not him.

He was a few feet taller when the pain substituted but still in a crouched position and was stared at by confusingly green, wide-pupilled eyes. He tried to speak, but the only sound, which came out of his mouth was a low growling, and he suddenly remembered the plan. 

His friends wouldn’t come if he didn’t howl.

The werewolf in the mirror took a careful step towards him and then another one, noticing how his movement was more awkward and jerky than usual. He felt hungry, just as he did when he woke up from full moons, but now it wasn’t just a faint memory. He felt hungry for the hunt, the kill and the blood of innocent creatures. He wanted out of this prison, he wanted to feel the wind in his fur and make this night his, and without giving his vocal cords the permission to do so, he let out a long, pained howl.

Twenty-six rounds of pacing in the room later, Remus heightened sense of hearing made notice of living presences in the rooms below him. Instead of following the persisting urge inside of him to hunt down, whoever was stupid enough to get close to him, he stayed where he was, crouched and alert.

He smelled them before he saw them. His inner wolf seemed to have an astounding memory of other animals’ scents, for someone who had never been outside of a building and recognized that there was first a dog, then a stag and then a little later, a small rat coming up the stairs. The latter he only noticed because he had been searching for him, as this place was utterly rat-infested.

He held his breath the moment the dog turned around the corner, appearing in the doorframe as big, black beast with wiggling tail.

Remus would have almost rolled his eyes at his boyfriend’s display of affection in the eye of a horrifying monster. 

The stag was slower, awkwardly knocking his antlers against the doorframe as they didn’t fit through at the first try. Remus didn’t dare to move, too scared that the wolf might leash out and launch himself at his friends. The big, black dog, who was actually Sirius and smaller than the werewolf lowered his tail to mime submission and came closer to  _ scent  _ the beast.

Remus followed him with the monster’s eyes, as he stalked around him and then cast an irritated look towards the stag, also known as James, who had finally made it into the room and looked comically large in comparison to the furniture.

Instead of soft laughter, the wolf let out a snarl, which made the dog recoil, but not far.

Behind the stag, a small rat was barely visible, Peter, who didn’t seem to plan on entering the room anytime soon. Suddenly Remus felt a wet snout on the side of his face and was taken aback by the boldness of the dog who was Sirius. He snarled a little bit but not too warningly as the wolf actually seemed to enjoy the company of the animals, and he felt no urge to harm them.

He uncurled a little bit, and Sirius started to wiggle his tail again. 

He barked, short and clear, probably to ask a question but Remus could only concentrate on the unbelievable fact that he didn’t want to kill his friends.

The stag pawed the ground as if impatient and hurled his massive antlers around to point at the door. They didn’t plan on leaving the shack, did they? Remus knew they were insane, but this?

Suddenly his face was licked, and everyone in the room froze. Then his face was licked again.

If dogs could grin, this one would be, radiating smugness and joy off in waves. He seemed so unworried, that Remus relaxed a little as well, noticing just now that all of his muscles had been tense. 

He slowly uncurled even more and ended up on all four, a position that would have usually felt unnatural but didn’t know. He bowed down to be on eye level with the dog and licked across his face as well.

It was strange that those idiots forced the hunger and bloodlust in the background by just being themselves. Remus couldn’t dwell on this thought for too long though, because a big pair of antlers poked carefully in his side, earning a snarl but just a soft one. The stag, James, pointed towards the door again and did something that couldn’t have been better described than as a little, excited hop.

Remus looked back at Sirius, who did something akin to a shoulder shrug and the werewolf answered with one of his own. To hell with it, he was in good company, the potion was working well, and he could always come back if it wore off.

After he indicated that he was okay with it, the stag started off, down the stairs and to the tunnel, causing such a hilarious sight, that Remus had to stop for a second.

The first time the wolf smelled fresh air in his life was accompanied by an involuntary howl that was cut short by a big, black dog tackling him and locking his face.

Next to the stag, which was stalking towards the forbidden forest, Remus could make out a small rat running around his legs as if it was nervous.

Remus felt the hunger heighten, probably because the wolf knew they were close to a castle full of young, fresh, beating hearts but Sirius all but shoved him in the direction of their friends and the thought was lost again.

It actually was overpowered by the thought to run, as fast as he could, to feel the wind in his fur and to prove once and for all that he was the fastest of the four of them. 

James seemed to understand his ambitions the second he was passed by him and started to run as well, not after him but alongside.

The rest of the night was a blur. A blur of things Remus couldn’t see in human form, because they were moving too fast or the surrounding was too dark and his friends, jumping around, being joyful and enjoying the freedom.

Peter had apparently run up the stag’s legs finding a save spot in his antlers except for when they play fought. 

Remus woke up as usual after a full moon, naked in the dust of the upstairs bedroom of the shack, but for the first time there was no unbearable pain, and he could uncurl immediately. He wished they stored clothes for him in here, but the wolf without potion would have ripped anything apart that smelled like his human self. 

This way he had to wait until Madam Pomfrey came to get him, so he decided to watch the sunrise through a crack in the wood of the shack.

When the matron of Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry entered the room and spotted him, she smiled warmly. Without a word, she handed him his pyjamas and a long, black coat and held out an arm as he was finally dressed. Life looked good, didn’t it?

As Remus’ head hid the hospital bed’s pillow, he was still grateful for the privacy as he, despite the potion, felt sore all over. He also didn’t want to wake his friends, who must be exhausted as well and in contrast to the fast healing wolf would have a lot of muscle ache by at least tomorrow. Also, they had class in about three hours, and they didn’t have a furry problem to excuse them if they were skipping it.

All in all, Remus felt the most refreshed he had ever felt after a full moon when he was waken in the late afternoon by the smell of chocolate and three noisy teenage boys trying to convince Madam Pomfrey that he had slept enough.

“Hiya”, he said resulting in a boy with long, black hair, lowering himself onto the edge of his bed and taking his hand after the matron had turned away and the other two positioning themselves on the mattress to his left.

“How are you doing?” Sirius had their hands laced together and his brows knitted tight in worry, but Remus could see the wiggling tail of the dog in his eyes.

“The best, I’ve ever been after a full moon”, the werewolf answered grinning widely at his friends. James smiled at him petting a probably still lightly shaken Peter on the back and fishing some chocolate frogs out of his pockets with the other hand.

“I don’t think he’ll need them anymore since he’s feeling so much better now.” Remus stared up at Sirius with a shocked expression which softened when he met the mischief in his boyfriend’s eyes.

“I think he’ll even need more because he had to put up with you all night”, James exclaimed tossing the chocolate onto the bed with a dramatic movement. “Especially with you licking his face, which was gross by the way. I thought for a second, I needed to change back to tell you two to get a room, but then I found the risk to be eaten alive to be too big. No offence.”

Remus couldn’t believe his friend apologized for something like that after he had seen him in his monster form.

“The werewolf was kind of fun though”, Peter piped up to all of their confusion. “What? After he didn’t snack me in the beginning, we ended up becoming good friends.”

“I mean you smelled kind of delicious”, Remus retorted and earned himself a shocked expression from the smaller boy and laughter from the others. “No, I’m just kidding, it was kind of really easy and fun for the first time in my life being the wolf with you three. I am very thankful for what you did for me.”

The “Aw” all-around was disrupted by James stating in an earnest voice that they shouldn’t get all too sentimental which made them crack up again.

Maybe this could be good; maybe this could make life easier. For now, at least, as they had so many adventures still ahead of them.


End file.
